Like two ships passing in the night … Jonathan Pearce’s abortive rebuttal

A couple weeks ago Jonathan MS Pearce asked me to provide a short statement of belief for a new series he was initiating called “Why I am a Christian” which was inspired by my “Why they don’t believe” series. So I obliged and Jonathan posted it here. Take a look, read my statement and Jonathan’s response, and then come on back for some discussion. I’ll wait.

* * *

Let’s take a look at some of Jonathan’s critical comments. He begins:

“So Randal has produced a large enough piece here but without, with all due respect, an awful lot of substance, philosophically speaking. By this I mean that he has kept his argument count to a minimum. He starts by claiming a properly basic belief in the correspondence theory of truth.”

I’m not sure what Jonathan means by “without … substance”, but I have an idea: It means I didn’t answer the question as an evidentialist. Apparently Jonathan wanted me to provide several arguments for Christianity, and when I failed to do this he complains that I “kept [my] argument count to a minimum.” Needless to say, if Jonathan just wanted me to provide a battery of arguments for God’s existence, I could have done so. Indeed, I already did in God or Godless. But Jonathan asked that I answer the question of why I’m a Christian. So for him to extend that invitation and then take the position that only evidentialist answers to that question have “philosophical substance” is question-begging and self-serving.

But Jonathan is undeterred. Though I failed to answer as an evidentialist, he decides to interpret my statement as if I were an evidentialist:

“[Randal’s] conclusion, which is pretty big, is reached by appeals to several things: the beauty of the world goodness and mercy in others, such as people helping others teleology, such as the eye that sees And that really is it. The problem for Randal is that, even given the brevity of such a task, this is simply not enough to derive a belief in God, for me at any rate. The beauty of the world can be explained in many ways (as I explained here), and many would conclude a subjective understanding of such beauty. I am not sure positing God to undergird it has any value. It also doesn’t very well explain all of the ugliness of the world: shit stained toilets in a slum; favelas where rape takes place next to burning litter; wolves tearing a caribou to death; a meteorite wiping out billions of organisms in a horrific explosion. Hardly beautiful.”

The problems with Jonathan’s summary are evident at the very beginning. I don’t, pace Jonathan, reach the “conclusion” that God exists by appealing “to several things”. By the same token, the world-realist doesn’t reach the conclusion that there is an external world by appeal to various things. Instead, perceptual experience provides the occasion for the formation of properly basic belief. Mutatis mutandis for belief in God (or, in the case of an atheist, non-belief in God).

Alas, it looks like Jonathan failed to understand what I wrote. Certainly he didn’t engage it. Consequently, he ends up by refashioning my statement as a strawman caricature of weak and underdeveloped evidences. And so he concludes: “And that really is it. The problem for Randal is that, even given the brevity of such a task, this is simply not enough to derive a belief in God….”

Even more strangely, Jonathan ends that last sentence by concluding “for me at any rate.” In other words, he seems to be chiding me for failing to provide sufficient argument for Jonathan to become a theist! But that wasn’t the task I was given and it is silly to think anybody is going to persuade another person to shift their most basic metaphysical commitments in a couple paragraphs.

Jonathan also badly misreads my reference to teleology. This is evident when he writes “Oh, and we pretty much know how the eye evolved.” This is presumably offered as a reply to my reference to “the inescapability of teleology – from eyes that are for seeing to lives that are for helping others”. Jonathan seems to think that there is some sort of teleological argument being offered here. That is yet more evidence of his poor reading based on evidentialist presuppositions. I’m not referring here to the origin of the eye but rather the fact that teleology is a basic category by which we order the world. We speak, for example, of eyes as being for seeing (among other things) such that eyes which cannot see fail to function properly. One can choose to treat all such design language as a mere facon de parler, but one only makes a judgment like that from another philosophical perspective (i.e. one in which the divine is understood to be non-agential). My point is that interpreting the world as having purpose is a properly basic, plausibly and indeed ineluctable way to look at the world.

Jonathan concludes with a couple putative defeaters. The first is the claim that aesthetic value is better understood to be subjective and even if it is objective, it need not be sourced in a transcendent agent. This, of course, is the start of a long conversation. But one must keep in mind here once again that I am not appealing here to an argument for the existence of God from objective aesthetics. Rather, I’m describing the way experiences of beauty provide the occasion for forming properly basic belief about God.

Jonathan’s second putative defeater is the problem of evil. Interestingly, of all the examples of evil he could have invoked, his first example of evil is “shit stained toilets in a slum”. Fortunately that one can be dealt with via a good toilet brush and a sprinkling of baking soda. At the same time I do recognize that the subsequent examples Jonathan provides are more troubling. But it is interesting to note that Jonathan doesn’t provide any formal argument here that evil ought to serve as a defeater for God’s existence. Instead, he enumerates some instances of evil and then states his own personal incredulity that God should allow such things. Now that’s what I call lacking philosophical substance.

In closing, Jonathan invited me to share, but he apparently didn’t really want to hear why I am a Christian. Consequently, he passed by the interesting discussion of what constitutes a properly basic belief and how belief in the external world does, and does not, provide an analogue for properly basic belief in the agential identity of the divine. Instead, Jonathan reworked my statements as an inchoate evidentialism which he could then knock down with a few indignant comments about the evils in the world. Two ships in the night with one Titanic misreading.

Jonathan also badly misreads my reference to teleology. This is evident when he writes “Oh, and we pretty much know how the eye evolved.” This is presumably offered as a reply to my reference to ”the inescapability of teleology – from eyes that are for seeing to lives that are for helping others”. Jonathan seems to think that there is some sort of teleological argument being offered here. That is yet more evidence of his poor reading based on evidentialist presuppositions. I’m not referring here to the origin of the eye but rather the fact that teleology is a basic category by which we order the world. We speak, for example, of eyes as being for seeing (among other things) such that eyes which cannot see fail to function properly. One can choose to treat all such design language as a mere facon de parler, but one only makes a judgment like that from another philosophical perspective (i.e. one in which the divine is understood to be non-agential). My point is that interpreting the world as having purpose is a properly basic, plausibly and indeed ineluctable way to look at the world.

I did say that. As I put it: “the inescapability of teleology – from eyes that are for seeing to lives that are for helping others”. I didn’t say anything about the origin of eyes. Rather, I referred to the purpose of eyes. Note as well that I referred to the purpose of lives. To apply a teleological argument to lives in the same way you apply it to eyes would lead to an absurdity. That should have been a tip off to you that your reading was fallacious.

I cannot be blamed for misreading such an under-explained point. The teleology surrounding the design of the eye is a heavily evolutionary argument. eg:

“The observed fact is that every species, and every organ that has ever been looked at within every species, is good at what it does. The wings of birds, bees and bats are good at flying. Eyes are good at seeing. Leaves are good at photosynthesizing.” Dawkins, Richard (2006). The God Delusion. Houghton Mifflin Co. p. 167

Jonathan, your whole attitude is one not of conversation toward mutual understanding but rather of quick rebuttal. So it is no surprise that you took such liberties of interpretation with a brief statement that you now call “under-explained”. If something is “under-explained” you should ask for further explanation before you leap to rebuttal.

i think this is exactly how to get the conversation going, as we can see! However, perhaps your rhetorical overtones stifle such a dialectical discourse? Even your title is derogatory and intentionally or not stifles honest and open discourse.

No, my title is accurate. As I explained, you read me as an evidentialist and consequently didn’t even engage my explanation of belief in terms of proper basicality. Consequently, your “critique” was indeed abortive.

But Jonathan is undeterred. Though I failed to answer as an evidentialist, he decides to interpret my statement as if I were an evidentialist:

Did you or did you not give those three reasons as contributing to your understanding of the divinity of reality? I think you really are being disingenuous here. Let me remind you of what you actually stated:

All my life the belief that the divine is an agent has been a natural, basic belief. Perhaps it is not as immediate and undeniable as belief in the external world. Certainly other rational individuals insist that for them the divine has never been an agent. But for most of my life, from the time snorkelling on the Great Barrier Reef to witnessing the birth of my child to standing in Sagrada Familia to the experience of goodness and mercy in others to the inescapability of teleology – from eyes that are for seeing to lives that are for helping others – I find time and again I am drawn with an undeniable immediacy to the belief that the divine is an agent. And thus, we are, most emphatically, not alone.

Like I said, you clearly don’t understand the statement and your quotation of me (along with the charge that I’m being disingenuous) makes that even more evident. That’s why I started with an explanation of how we come to have belief in the external world and it isn’t through evidence reasoning to a conclusion.

The problem is that you asserted a properly basic belief and then added all those in as causing you to be “drawn with an undeniable immediacy to the belief that the divine is an agent”.

So I am not quite sure why you are getting rather fiery about this. It seems fairly obvious that you are asserting a properly basic belief (without expressing particularly why it should be) and then going on to evidence that belief.

I attack that evidence which you have clearly cited, and you accuse me of not understanding the statement. I am not sure you are correct to do so.

Jonathan, when folks sense perceive they are drawn with an undeniable immediacy to the belief that the external world exists. But that doesn’t mean that sense perceptual experience provides evidence for belief in an external world. If an evidentialist did try to construe belief in the external world this way then that belief would be unjustified since the data of experience would support idealism equally well. (I already explained this in the article.)

I don’t buy that. What does ‘drawn to’ mean if not influenced to believe based on the evidence? C’mon!

But for most of my life, from seeing programmes on Roswell and visiting Area 51 to witnessing the strange lights in the sky to the experience of feeling watched to the inescapability of probabilities – from the massive size of the universe and number of planets – I find time and again I am drawn with an undeniable immediacy to the belief that the aliens exist.

Do you now see the form of your argument? That you mentioned those things and causally linked them to being drawn to agent divinity clearly shows that my criticism was warranted.

Yes. I think there are problems for some properly basic beliefs which can sound an awful lot like appeals to strong psychological convictions. I could claim the same properly basic belief you do for an evil God, or indeed for any type of God, and you would be hard pressed to differentiate (rationally) mine from yours. Which is when you then start appealing to inductive ideals. Which is when I start critiquing you. Which then leaves you with a “well, it just feels like it is!” without being able to appeal to any external factor. It appears, though, not to be a self-evident axiom.

But to claim a properly basic belief without really giving anything of rational substance to defend it (otherwise I could claim a properly basic belief for pretty much anything); and then to go on and deliver evidential reasons that draw you to it only to harangue me for critiquing them is a little unfair, methinks.

“Yes. I think there are problems for some properly basic beliefs which can sound an awful lot like appeals to strong psychological convictions.”

Of course properly basic beliefs often come with strong psychological convictions. Why would you think otherwise? Whether the belief is “rape is evil” or “There is a world external to my mind” or “1+1=2” a common hallmark of proper basicality is psychological conviction.

I think you’re doing epistemology by the seat of your pants which is why you misunderstood my presentation in the first place. So I’d encourage you to revisit the parallel with belief in the external world and other properly basic beliefs with more care and then develop a case as to why you think belief in God cannot be among that range of beliefs.

The problem you face is that there is strong intuition that EVERYONE ON EARTH has that we are living in a real world. But even if we aren’t, meh.

But with YOUR assertion of GOD as a PBB, you are making the same appeal to intuition, except it is not universal. All sorts of people do not have that same intuition. In fact, I can JUST AS EASILY CLAIM that I have a properly basic belief, based on the ugliness and suffering in the world, THAT GOD DOES NOT EXIST.

So you have to appeal to external reasons that DRAW you to your PBB. I critiqued them and you belittled my critique.

And again you try to belittle my knowledge of PBBs. I am fine with my understanding. I just think your claims are weak. I encourage you to revisit your presentation and improve it! 😉

So your claim is that for a belief to be properly basic for a person there must be a universal disposition among human persons to accept that belief?

Assuming that is your criterion, it is by definition not properly basic since I don’t accept it and most epistemologists don’t accept it. That means if you are to be justified in accepting it, it is because it is non-basic and derived from beliefs that are themselves properly basic.

Can you please explain how you derive your criterion from beliefs that are properly basic?

No, that is not a criterion, but it does offer weight. And I think this might be the basis of your admission that the real world is a stronger PBB? If not, what was behind your admission there?

I think PBBs can be problematic since they end up looking, often, like assertions for which one can posit the antithesis as an equally valid PBB as I did (and to which you have not responded).

Eg

“There is a problem here, because the sorts of ordinary beliefs we are discussing are clearly open to rational criticism. For example, I might look at a tree and form the belief that I see a tree, but I can be convinced that what I see is not a tree. Similarly about my memory of my breakfast, or my interpretation of a person’s emotions. There is nothing that prevents people from engaging in a rational discussion of their beliefs about what they see, what they’ve eaten, and how people look. So why claim that these beliefs do not require argumentative support for their justification or warrant? These are just the sorts of beliefs that can be questioned and defended with argument.

If we regard properly basic beliefs as whatever beliefs are “naturally and spontaneously” formed in various situations, then they are not clearly justified (or justifiable) without argumentative support. Calling a belief “properly basic” does not give one license to avoid rational criticism. It just says something about the origins of their beliefs, in terms of psychology and circumstance. We need something more if we are going to say that some beliefs are justified without argument.”

And can you succinctly describe which theory of justification, knowledge and noetic structure you hold? Because you seem to be all over the map which leaves me suspecting that you really have no clear views on the matter.

“Because you seem to be all over the map which leaves me suspecting that you really have no clear views on the matter.” – Dr. Rauser

I read (2x) the 28-page document you presented re. predation and carnivory, and I did not detect that you fully endorsed one specific proposed explanation re. why God allowed predation and carnivory to occur.

“And can you succinctly describe which theory of justification, knowledge and noetic structure you hold?” – Dr.Rauser

Can you succinctly describe why you believe God allowed predation and carnivory to occur?

Thanks for reading it (2x!). That is a chapter out of an ill-fated book proposal the purpose of which was to introduce problems and avenues of solution but not to offer a specific solution. I offered it as an overview of the problem and some proposed avenues of resolution, but not as a means to offer “the solution”. Sorry that it disappointed in that regard.

The problem of natural evil is a subset of the general problem of evil. In both cases I appeal to a number of theodicies — free will, greater goods in terms of second-order goods, moral histories, sustained natural laws, compensatory resurrection, and so on — as well as a skeptical theistic backdrop.

I mean by this that the notion that something is held to by the entire population of earth gives some greater credibility to a claimed PBB that one which is not afforded that universality.

And please take notice of this criticism:

You are very good at asking questions, but terrible at answering them. You get asked quite a number of questions and only appear to select ones to answer rather carefully. Please don’t answer my questions by simply asking your own.

[[You are very good at asking questions, but terrible at answering them. You get asked quite a number of questions and only appear to select ones to answer rather carefully. Please don’t answer my questions by simply asking your own.]]

Well said Johnny, I hope Randal dwells on this, because it is salient to all of us.

One more thing. Your criterion presumably includes the (assumed) stipulation that persons must be functioning properly. Surely then, you are sufficiently familiar with Plantinga’s epistemology to know that this stipulation is, in fact, met.

But we need not even get to that point since you first need to defend the contentious criterion you’ve presented.

“At the same time I do recognize that the subsequent examples Jonathan provides are more troubling.” – Dr. Rauser

Would you care to expand upon this? Why do you state that Jonathan’s graphic example of carnivorousness is troubling? Do you believe God created the lions in the video to behave as they do? If so, why should it be troubling?

2) God compensates, possibly, in animal immortality. This is even more problematic than 1) since compensation does not and cannot morally justify, it can only compensate (hence the term). See, eg Stephen Maitzen.

If you want to engage this topic seriously, you should take a look at the work of Christopher Southgate, Michael Murray and Trent Dougherty.

However, I would encourage you not to use derogatory labels like “omniscience escape clause”. When naturalists say things like “We don’t understand how consciousness arose but someday we will” I don’t berate them as invoking the “future science escape clause”.

The difference being that we have exceptionally good inductive reason to favour the natural sciences finding the answer – in fact it is a probabilistic conclusion. See Jeff Lowder’s Argument from the History of Science which I know you have interacted with. YOUR appeal to the unknown has NO successful inductive data to support it. What naturalistic explanation has ever been replaced by the supernatural? It is one-way, explanatorily speaking.

I am and have engaged with the topic seriously, and you have not succeeded in defending it, even with your paper. That there COULD be a greater good poses many problems, not least that God appears to be using humans and animals as a means to an end (greater good) – somewhat defying any kind of deontological morality. In other words, God is a consequentialist and clearly does not underwrite morality as theists like to think. He is redundant.

Moreover, in all his omnipotence, he cannot devise a system whereby biodiversity exists without BILLIONS AND BILLIONS of organisms suffering?

You appeal, as Loftus would say, to the possibility without ever wondering whether it is plausible or probable, it appears.

That animals are ripped apart alive so that other animals can merely exist is incredible given God’s omnipowers. To look at that video and think “God designed that. He knew it would happen and actualised that. God is love.” is something I could never do.

Scientists should willingly update their current understanding of any phenomena with a better understanding of said phenomena based upon judicious application of the scientific method. However, you apparently embrace beliefs that are not subject to such rigors (e.g. humans have a soul). If, by chance, you know of a controlled experiment that will validate the existence of a soul, I should like to see it.

Maybe dishonest was too harsh. I apologize. Nonetheless, the alleged failure of naturalism to explain consciousness has nothing to do with the alleged failure of theism to account for evil. I get annoyed when we combine totally unrelated questions. If the argument of evil is successful, then it doesn’t much matter (in terms of theology) that naturalism cannot account for consciousness (or anything).

Let me try to make up for my untoward remark with this:

There is a very excellent question the was posed this morning on your other thread of the day (Holy War in the Bible a Review). It is easy to find if you filter by best (most upvotes). Responding to that question would be a much better use of your time than criticizing Jonathan’s alleged rhetorical excesses.

The point I was making is that none of this has anything to do with the validity of any argument.

But I understand the annoyance. And like I said, I think that I misread you initially. I apologize again. But my point still stands. It does not matter what naturalists believe. The appeal to cognitive limitations is either legitimate or not.

I would love to discuss that issue further in the context of my comments in the Holy War in the Bible thread.

That’s ok. I get annoyed when Randal refuses to explain how he differentiates between theological propositions that are absurd (snakes talking and zombies walking through Jerusalem) and which are not (virgin birth and physical resurrection).

“What does how naturalists respond to the problem of consciousness have to do with how theists ought to respond to the problem of evil?”

Both theists and atheists posit present human cognitive limitations as a means to explain prima facie difficulties with their belief. It is equally uncharitable to characterize either as an “escape clause”. So I’m simply asking Jonathan to apply the Golden Rule here and you suggest I’m being dishonest?!

First, the problems are not on a par. There is no argument from consciousness against naturalism that is even remotely compelling. Because there is nothing about naturalism that even remotely entails that consciousness should not exist. But there is something about theism that obviously entails that unnecessary evil should not exist. So I do not see the parity.

But, in any event, all of this is irrelevant to the point I was making. Your criticism was an ad hominem tu quoque fallacy. It does not matter if naturalists appeal to cognitive limitations. If it is a bad argument to appeal to cognitive limitations, then it is a bad argument. Period. The fact that naturalists do it, even if it is true, does not entail that it is okay for theists to do it. (Of course, it also does not entail that it is not okay). But the point is that Jonathan was calling you to task for asserting that human cognitive limitations are a good reason to doubt the force of the problem of evil. If that is the question (whether the appeal to limitations is legitimate) then pointing out that naturalists appeal to cognitive limitations is completely irrelevant. You can defend the appeal by saying “you do it too.” That Jonathan or anyone else does it tells us nothing about the argumentative move’s legitimacy.

Now, I think you are a smart guy, so I believe that you understand this. I do not believe that you actually think that the Golden Rule is useful in determining when an argument is good. If you were merely asking him to use inoffensive language because he would not like offensive language directed at him, then fine. I apologize for misreading you. That possibility, which did not occur to me until after I posted my response above, is the basis for my apology below. But the fact that naturalists might engage in an argumentative move that is the subject of criticism is clearly not relevant in the least to the question of whether it is a good argumentative move.

Okay. But my response is that it certainly seems that necessary evil exists.

Suppose someone said that mountains don’t exist. The only legitimate response would be “It certainly seems that they do.”And it the two claims are roughly on par: It is just as likely that mountains are a collective hallucination as it is that unnecessary evil does not exist.

Furthermore, if we are going to suppose that there might not be unnecessary evil, then why would we also not suppose that God might command genocide. In both cases, it is possible that there are some goods that necessity the things in question.

But how should we understand that inability? Is it a cognitive deficiency? I don’t think so. Does it stem from an impoverished understanding of the depths of suffering that has occurred in the world? I think that might be closer to the truth.

It is difficult to actually mention real cases of horrible and unnecessary evils. It is unpleasant and can be insensitive. But I think if someone is going to deny that unnecessary evil exists, then they should be shown a clear example with the accompanying explanation of why it is unnecessary. The onus would then be on them to explain the basis for their inability/refusal to believe that it is unnecessary.

No. If God is all-powerful and all-loving, then he would eliminate it no matter where it comes from. I am very limited in power, but I do my best to eliminate any evil that I can, no matter what the source.

You can’t just eliminate evil. Evil is a serious thing. You have to deal with it in a serious way. In order to get rid this world of evil, you would have to eliminate all sources of evil. Including you and me. Essentially throw this world in the garbage bin, and starting over from scratch.

And of course God could have done that, right after the fall.. But he didn’t want to destroy humanity. He looked down the ages.. he saw you and me.. And he said to himself.. “My creations are precious to me. I will not destroy them. I will permit evil to endure, in order to save as many as possible. And then I shall deal with evil.” And so he set that plan in motion.

A plan that was first revealed to humanity, when he told Adam and Eve, that the offspring of the woman would crush the head of the snake. A plan that lead to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And a plan that will soon lead to the destruction of this evil world. And the rebuilding of a new.

[OK, a chance to practice what Randal preaches in terms of suggested tact …]

JohnM, first of all, I’m not sure what you mean by saying you believe what you read in the Bible. Do you believe that the events in Genesis 3 occurred as described (eg. a snake actually spoke to Adam and Eve) or do you read Genesis 3 as an ancient near eastern cosmogonic creation narrative (in other words, never intended by the author to be taken literally).

If you believe that the events described in Genesis 3 occurred as described, how do you square the literal Adam & Eve with the theory of evolution by natural selection?

I estimate that between my Sunday school days and the present I have read/heard Genesis 3 at least a hundred times. Please answer my questions. I’ll repeat them:

Do you believe that the events in Genesis 3 occurred as described (eg. a snake actually spoke to Adam and Eve) or do you read Genesis 3 as an ancient near eastern cosmogonic creation narrative (in other words, never intended by the author to be taken literally).

If you believe that the events described in Genesis 3 occurred as described, how do you square a literal Adam & Eve with the theory of evolution by natural selection?

OK, thanks for answering the first question. Now please answer the second. Also (and please don’t be offended by this question), I presume that you accept that you shouldn’t believe everything you read. Why does that adage not apply to the Bible? If your answer is that the Bible is the infallible word of God, how have you arrived at that conclusion? Thanks. TAM.

You believe what you read in the bible, not what we read in the bible. Two people in the same Christian church, assembly or group, do not believe in the same manner. Tell us what you believe, not that anybody gives a rat ass, but just for the sake of conversation.

JohnM, if what we read in the Bible is “God’s truth” and two different Christians give me differing interpretations of Genesis 3, how do I figure out who is right and who is wrong? Just looking for some help here.

Well in order to find out who’s right and who’s wrong, you would need insight and wisdom. So reading the text for yourself, would be a start. After that, you could start comparing what the text actually says, to what the two sides are saying… And maybe even be able to point out contradictions between the text and what the different people are saying.

I think you must grant me that there can be insightful and wise Christians who differ quite strongly on their interpretation of the Bible. For example, the host of this site has offered his opinion that Genesis 3 is not intended to be taken literally. I presume that you can find me a Christian authority to suggest otherwise. I would like to know how you or I or anyone can discern the truth (i.e. that which corresponds to reality) about who is right and who is wrong. Surely we agree that they both can’t be right – correct?

I agree that neither of us are oracles. However, you seem to have made up your mind that a literal interpretation of Genesis 3 is to be preferred to one which treats it as a creation myth. In fact, I readily grant that you might be correct (although, to be fair, I strongly doubt it). I am just trying to understand how you have made up your mind and how you square a literal reading of Genesis 3 with facts like “snakes don’t talk”.

Run JohnM, run as fast as you can, but you cannot hide your ignorance, not even behind the ignorant writers of the bible. You cannot even hide behind your ignorant god you paint with your “knowledge” and “wisdom” to make it/he/she looks “omniwhatever: potent, benevolent or scient”.

You talk like a preacher whose income is money from the gullible. Your talk is cheap, and you even offer it at a discount, but what you offer is boasting empty, hollow, incoherent ideas. If someone find you as a fraud, do you think you can escape with that inane excuse: “Make up your own mind about who’s right.”?

People make up their minds in the Christian arena, what makes you think you hold the “truth”? The fact that you are asking a skeptic, a deist, or athiest : “Make up your own mind about who’s right.”? Do you hope they’ll find your “truth” as an absolute truth? Dream on! Heresy among Christians is still ragging.

“YOU heard that it was said, ‘You must love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ However, I say to YOU: Continue to love YOUR enemies and to pray for those persecuting YOU; that YOU may prove yourselves sons of YOUR Father who is in the heavens, since he makes his sun rise upon wicked people and good and makes it rain upon righteous people and unrighteous. For if YOU love those loving YOU, what reward do YOU have? (Matthew 5:43-46)

“But now really put them all away from YOU, wrath, anger, badness, abusive speech, and obscene talk out of YOUR mouth. Do not be lying to one another. Accordingly, [] clothe yourselves with the tender affections of compassion, kindness, lowliness of mind, mildness, and long-suffering. Continue putting up with one another and forgiving one another freely if anyone has a cause for complaint against another. Even as Jehovah freely forgave YOU, so do YOU also. But, besides all these things, [clothe yourselves with] love, for it is a perfect bond of union.” – Colossians 3:8,9, 12-14.

What is feckless about these “Christian tenets” is that they plagiarized these tenets. Christianity is a fake, plagiarized and fabricated ideology, imposed with brutality between the time of Constantine up the the end of the Dark Ages. Humanity have those tenets without Christianity in them anyway. Christianity does not even respect its “own” tenets. That’s irresponsible about Christianity, that’s why Christianity prints Monopoly money or even fake money. Christianity has no value even if they copied tenets and published as being their own.

i. I don’t know what planet you came from, but here on Earth, Catholics and Eastern Orthodoxy, even before the “great schism”, ARE the incipience of the Christian virus. They came up with that religion called Christianity. I heard some bananas talking about “Jesus” without Christianity, but it does not make sense either.

ii. Jesus was not the first to teach ‘Love Your Enemy’. The teaching predates Jesus” “Do not return evil to your adversary; Requite with kindness the one who does evil to you, Maintain justice for your enemy, Be friendly to your enemy.” – Akkadian Councils of Wisdom (from the ancient Babylonian civilization that existed two millennia before Jesus was born)

i. The word “Christ” is a Greek translation of the Hebrew “Messiah”. The founders of the new religion – Christianity, were the ones who used for the first time “Christian” after hundreds of years after the death of the presupposed Jesus. Gospels, as “pure” description of Jesus, do not mention Jesus as a starter of Christianity. It was a later idea of the Christian church (Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Christianity).

ii. There was never a “Christ” who plagiarized. “Christ” was an invention of then new religion.There were the birthers of the new religion – Christianity, who plagiarized. What you don’t understand?

ii. Argumentum assertio means “argument by assertion.” In other words, just because you say something is so doesn’t make it so. You need to buttress your claims with evidence otherwise they simply just don’t have any purchase whatsoever. Follow?

The discussion is about unnecessary evil (also called gratuitous evil). You are talking about necessary evil.

Now, I disagree that all human caused evil is necessary, but that is a different discussion. The point is that if an evil is not required either for (a) preventing something equally bad or worse, or else (b) assuring the existence of some greater good, then the evil is unnecessary.

Because there is no necessary evil. It’s quite possible for human beings to speak the truth all the time. Rather, it us us who introduce untruth and falsehood, because we are fallen evil beings, a shadow of what we were.

And there is no such thing as justified evil. Either it is righteous and just or it is not. Either something is good or it’s evil. There is no such thing as a good form of bad. There is no such thing as a true lie.

And no, Gods wrath upon the wicked is not evil. It is righteous and just. It’s a fitting reward for the injustice done.

And no, you cannot eliminate evil by caring for the poor. You cannot eliminate evil by comforting a rape victim. Sure, it’s a good thing to do and worth doing. But in the big picture, you’re doing nothing more than putting a tiny bandage on an open wound.

And a fawn dying for days in a forest fire unknown to anyone is surely offering nothing toward a greater good. Appealing to the unproven idea that God is omnibenevolent falls somewhat short of being good enough.

3) Because the Danish Prime Minister is Rasmussen who was also the worst cheater ever at the Tour de France! ( He’s confusing 2 different people ).

4) Because Satan’s native language is actually Danish! ( Really? )

5) Because The Danes created Pippi Longstocking ( no. That was the sweedish author Astrid Lindgren, )

But hey.. At least he didn’t make the common mistake of thinking that we’re a bunch of atheists.. ( around 80% membership of state church.. And atop of that, you have Muslims, Jews, Evangelical Christians like me ).

We’ve been trough this. I can only repeat what I said before. Goodness and being are convertible. It is established for me at this point that God is omni-benevolent, and an omni-benevolent being would not allow unnecessary evil. It’s like, say, we live on a planet with no mountains, but you eat hallucinogen fruits that I know make you see mountains. You can claim that you see them all you want and that doesn’t change the fact that there are no mountains.

Now the question of possible necessity of genocide is more intriguing. I’m tempted to say “yes” because it is hard for me to see how such a command would be metaphysically impossible. I sure hope it’s impossible though. Still, when we talk about evil, the traditional thought is that God cannot get us all into the state of perfect life, without allowing evil. To argue that he himself would have to subject us to evil is an enormous stretch.

It is established for me at this point that God is omni-benevolent, and an omni-benevolent being would not allow unnecessary evil. Kerk, I don’t think anyone will take issue with that definition of omni-benevolence. The question is why, when faced with overwhelming evidence of unnecessary evil, you still insist that your God exists.

TAM, you haven’t read a lot of me, have you? I lean heavily towards Thomism, which is based in Aristotelian metaphysics. Aquinas’s Five Ways establishes not only that there is the First Mover, but also that that mover has to be a benevolent agent.

See, all this stuff is established to me by pure reason, and no amount of evidence about evil can trump it.

So you know that his arguments are subject to criticism. I can say with a great deal of confidence that the claim that the prime mover must be omnibenevolent is based on an invalid inference. But I wouldn’t mind hearing your argument.

Kerk, I hope you stay… and keep commenting. I want to hear more about this Five Ways. I know Feser is the go-to man, but something about his writing annoys me, I think it’s the verbosity and the way he talks about atheists.

The essence of the argument does. Just because there’s gun violence it doesn’t follow that guns are the product of “poof” instead of an ordered mind. Likewise, the presence of individuals who do evil things does nothing to doubt the existence of a Creator: http://bit.ly/11EyvgO

If anything, your innate visceral reaction to acts of evil is a testament to the existence of our Creator:

(1) If God does not exist, objective moral values and duties do not exist. (2) Evil exists. (3) Therefore, objective moral values and duties do exist. (4) Therefore, God exists. (5) Therefore, God is the locus of all objective moral values and duties.

In other words, as Dostoevsky once mused, “If there is no God, everything is permitted.”

You tool. It was your analogy, he pointed it out as being fallacious (false analogy) since you are comparing limited knowledge gun manufacturers with omniscient God, and then you call that a non sequitur?

A baby dies of cancer. She suffers for six months prior. You are saying that every ounce of her suffering (and her parents and her siblings and he grandparents, etc. etc., etc.), that all of this suffering had to happen? That whatever goods God might realize, he had to allow every ounce of that suffering in order to realize these wonderful goods? Really?

This is, to use Randal’s words, the God who spoke the universe into existence we are talking about here. Please explain why one should not find the idea that such a being could not have prevented this evil incredible? (And by “could not have” here I mean “could not have without sacrificing some greater good or bringing about some evil equally bad or worse.)

Yes, Ivan, that’s exactly what I’m saying. And I myself am no stranger to immense childhood suffering, as Chernobyl’s radiation reached the place where I lived, so don’t even think of calling me a hypocrite or heartless cynic or something.

I already said all I needed to say. I don’t know what the reason may be. It doesn’t matter. I got the Five Ways.

But thanks. I never came close to calling you any of those things. I only asked for the explanation for why an all powerful God has to allow children to suffer. You say that you have no idea. I suggest that this is because there is no explanation. I do not suggest that you are callous.

Without a doubt Aquinas’s science is dated and flawed. This does not, however, mean that his metaphysics are so easily refuted. Most modern “refutations” of the Quinque Viae are rooted in misconceptions about Aristotelian metaphysics. We moderns have been indoctrinated with a mechanistic conception of reality–one that is devoid of formal and final causation.

Thanks for the reply. To your point, not all modern philosophers agree re. what an appropriate definition of “metaphysics” is in modern times vs. ancient times. Here is a link to the Stanford Encyclopedia on this subject:

———- It is not easy to say what metaphysics is. Ancient and Medieval philosophers might have said that metaphysics was, like chemistry or astrology, to be defined by its subject matter: metaphysics was the “science” that studied “being as such” or“the first causes of things” or “things that do not change.” It is no longer possible to define metaphysics that way, and for two reasons. First, a philosopher who denied the existence of those things that had once been seen as constituting the subject-matter of metaphysics – first causes or unchanging things – would now be considered to be making thereby a metaphysical assertion. Secondly, there are many philosophical problems that are now considered to be metaphysical problems (or at least partly metaphysical problems) that are in no way related to first causes or unchanging things; the problem of free will, for example, or the problem of the mental and the physical. ———-

Okay, Randal. I read the entire 28-page document twice. The document was informative. Thank you for sharing it.

You discuss various proposed explanations in the report re. why predation and animal suffering occur, but you do not appear to fully endorse any one specific proposal. Is it possible that you could briefly summarize specifically what you do believe re. why predation and animal suffering occur?

What’s wrong with the video? It’s just predation. Predation happens, and is neither good nor evil. Lions are neither good nor evil. Hyenas are neither good nor evil. That you find it repulsive is just some irrational instinct, for scenes like that are precisely how you got here in the first place. Saying “That’s horrible! And your god of love must not exist because he lets it happen!” isn’t really an argument since “That’s horrible” isn’t really meaningful without some kind of objective measure of good and evil.

Evolution is impossible without predation. Evolution is impossible without genetic mutation, which means cancer is possible. Earthquakes happen due to plate tectonics, but without plate tectonics there would likely not be life on earth at all. If you find predation repulsive, you’re just not seeing the big picture.

And c’mon. Are you telling me you don’t see any beauty in a well-executed cheetah kill?

Incidentally, predation shouldn’t be a problem for a Christian. God loves gazelles, and sometimes he loves to feed them to lions (Job 38:39). Not feeding gazelles to lions would be a greater evil.

Theists can claim suffering is evil because theists assume an objective definition of evil. Jonathan doesn’t.

Unless you’re a young-earth creationist, you have to deal with the reality that there were millions of years of predation before humans appeared. There are multiple ways of dealing with it. The point of my comment however was just to point out that “your god allows suffering” is a toothless charge from someone who can make no objective claim about suffering in the first place.

“but it offers no explanation for what he feels when he watches it, or even why he should feel anything at all.”

This is just the tu quoque fallacy and you are trying to shift the burden of proof on to me. I could just as well not exist and the criticism remains. I can give you plenty of reasons why I feel as I do based on empathy and mirror neurons and psychology and even morality. But that is totally irrelevant. God is on trial here, not me.

Kerk has rightly pointed out the problem. You seem to claim that suffering has no negative connotations. Perhaps you should do a Kantian experiment – would you prefer a world where no one suffers or where everyone suffers?

And you seem to think that evolution is impossible without predation. You need to define what evolution is, or what its end result is. If it is biodiversity, you are effectively saying an omniGod is unable to create biodiversity without huge amounts of pain and suffering.

In fact, you whole response appears to make God impotent. Fine for an atheist, but almost all theists would greatly disagree with most everything you say.

An atheist can’t legitimately make the argument that since suffering is bad, God is either evil or doesn’t exist. This is because “suffering is bad” is nonsensical without an objective definition of “bad” — something you cannot provide. The most you can say is “I don’t like that”. But that’s simply a preference — not an argument — and has no bearing on reality. In a world without God, predation simply happens and was in fact necessary to produce you. Claiming it is “bad” is irrational, and not in any way evidence-based.

Now, you may level the charge that “suffering creates a theological problem for Christians”. But Christians already know this (and have in fact been thinking about it long before atheists brought it up), and there are thousands upon thousands of pages addressing it. Posting a youtube video and going “There! Explain that!” is lazy. This is neither an argument for or against God, however. Besides, since what you’re doing is primarily having an emotional reaction (in the absence of an objective definition of “bad”), no amount of rational explanation will satisfy you.

The Christian needs to account for why suffering exists. The atheist needs to account for why he cares (or should care) that it does. Neither have an easy task, but in my experience the Christians have made a better run at it than the atheists have.

I’m sorry… Was there an argument in there that I missed? Of course nobody wants to be eaten by hyenas. But if hyenas don’t eat, herbivores reproduce unrestrained and eventually destroy their own ecosystem. If predation doesn’t exist, natural selection doesn’t happen and thinking primates don’t evolve. Your black-and-white “positive or negative value” dichotomy is a false one. Predation sucks for the individual prey, but is a positive overall from the view of a (rational) thinking primate.

Jonathan’s has repeatedly (and succinctly) pointed out that an he believes an “omnibenevolent” God COULD have created a format for life where this did not have to occur. If you believe YHWH allows for the suffering of animals for some “greater good”, you are certainly entitled to hold such an opinion.

What is the evidence for such a belief? I personally can’t engineer a planet that could produce and sustain humans without predation. Any claim that “Well, I don’t know how but I’m sure God could do it” is so much hand-waving and not at all the basis of an argument. For all we know, it’s not actually possible. I can draw an Escher staircase, but Jonathan can’t build it.

The claim that “the universe doesn’t work the way I would do it if I were God, therefore God probably doesn’t exist” is fallacious to the point of embarrassment. I don’t know why atheists trot it out so often.

RonH, are you suggesting that an omniGod who created a universe and all life within it was constrained in some fashion re. the format for life?

“The claim that “the universe doesn’t work the way I would do it if I were God, therefore God probably doesn’t exist” is fallacious to the point of embarrassment” -RonH

I wasn’t aware that Jonathan (specifically) made such a claim. I believe Jonathan pointed out that he would not accept the characterization of an omnibenevolent God as one who created the current format for life.

BTW, I would not personally characterize the behaviour of the lions in the video as “evil” any more than the reality that the lions WILL starve to death if it doesn’t get enough to eat. What we see in the video is reality. I am under the impression that Jonathan believes such a format for life is more likely explained by naturalism than being the design of an onmibenevolent God. As far as what “evidence” he might have to hold that belief, I would defer to him.

are you suggesting that an omniGod who created a universe and all life within it was constrained in some fashion re. the format for life?

In a sense, yes. Not even God can have his cake and eat it too. For example, God could conceivably create a universe where light moved at 55mph. But, physical constants being what they are, he most likely wouldn’t have a universe that could produce sentient beings. Once I choose to carve a sculpture out of a block of marble 10ft square, I will be limited in the size of what I can carve. Every choice one makes collapses other possibilities. A universe in which the creatures can make choices themselves adds an even greater dimension.

Regardless, whatever “omniGod” you’re talking about, it isn’t the Christian one. The Christian God takes responsibility for lions eating gazelles (c.f. the Job reference I cited earlier). And, in fact, a lion hunt has a fierce and dangerous beauty all its own. I deny neither the beauty nor the pain, because they are real and all of a piece. In a non-teleological universe, however, neither means anything at all, and pretending they do is simply illusion. Jonathan may think naturalism is a better explanation for what he sees in the video, but it offers no explanation for what he feels when he watches it, or even why he should feel anything at all.

“but it offers no explanation for what he feels when he watches it, or even why he should feel anything at all.”

That is entirely irrelevant to my point. Again, my point would be that God is either the greatest conceivable being or not. And surely, if biodiversity was what she wanted, and if she could create perpetual miracles, being constrained by the exact parameters that this particular world permits seems to make God somewhat impotent. All animals could photosynthesise as plants do (and there is huge biodiversity there). Or indeed, why need finite energy at all?

This is all hand-waving again. When it comes to designing planetary biospheres, you have no idea what’s possible and what isn’t. Nobody does. Saying “Well, God could have made the world like X” is irrational, as you have no context at all.

All your point consists of is “If I were God, the world wouldn’t work like this”. OK. All you’ve proven is that you aren’t God. Your point has no relevance to whether or not God actually exists.

Since God created the laws of physics, supposedly, I imagine a damn site more is possible than you think. You are doing a Dinesh D’Souza here – waving away tsunamis because that is the way plate tectonics works, without seeming to consider that that was exactly what God designed and actualised down to the physics which defines the ontology of the universe.

But to take it one step further, if you think God has omniscience, and given that most theists believe she knows all counterfactuals, then God has no need to create at all. If God knows agent X will do Y in causal circumstance C, then why bother creating at all, especially since C requires X to suffer?

The rather ad hoc rationalisations you posit are eliminated in the simpler and more explanatorily powerful naturalism.

This is not hand-waving. You really appear to constrain God’s power with naturalistic law. Your god sounds a little pathetic, with all due respect. Can he do perpetual miracles (or do you adhere to a Van Inwagen regularity defence?)?

Actually, my point is that the existence of suffering itself is neither for nor against the existence of God. You’re trying to claim it makes God less likely, but you can’t justifiably say that since you have no meaningful frame of reference. If you had experience of universes both with and without God, you might stand a chance at being able to tell whether or not this one did. Unfortunately, we only have the one data point.

As for my god being pathetic… Well, you’re an atheist. All gods are pathetic to you, are they not? I’m not constraining God with natural law, because God himself is the originator of natural law. God decides what universe he chooses to create, and can create any universe that is actualizable. That means he can’t make universes with square circles, burritos so big he can’t eat them, or impossible Escher staircases. I’d rather have a universe with both beauty and ugliness, than a universe with neither, so I don’t find it difficult to speculate that God would feel likewise. You seem to know that a universe with only beauty is possible, and thus damn God for not making it. But I can’t see how you’d know this. One cannot have a universe with only light and no darkness (and even if one did, the inhabitants of it would be incapable of realizing the fact).

“You seem to know that a universe with only beauty is possible, and thus damn God for not making it. But I can’t see how you’d know this. One cannot have a universe with only light and no darkness (and even if one did, the inhabitants of it would be incapable of realizing the fact).” – RonH

Many Christians believe YHWH will ultimately create a new Heaven and a new Earth of perfection that will be completely devoid of all suffering and death. I understand Randal believes that:

If you believe YHWH has a reason for allowing physical suffering and death of animals on Earth as a precursor to a new creation devoid of suffering and death, you are entitled to that belief. If not, it seems unimaginative to suggest an onmiGod was constrained re. the current format of life. An onmiGod should be able to provide physical beings with another source of “energy” than other physical beings that suffer and die during the “energy transfer process”. In fact, some plants and autotrophs get their energy via photosynthesis.

“In a sense, yes. Not even God can have his cake and eat it too.” – RonH

RonH, I understand Randal (and many other Christians) believe YHWH will create a new Heaven and a new Earth that will ultimately be devoid of suffering and death. If you accept the notion that there is a purpose for suffering and death on this Earth (even before mankind existed on Earth) as a precursor to a new creation, you are entitled to hold that view. If you don’t accept that notion, it seems rather unimaginative to suggest an omniGod was constrained re. creating life in its current format. An omniGod certainly could be able to create living creatures that get a sufficient supply of “energy” apart from preying upon and consuming other creatures.

I would give Jonathan more credit re. his understanding of Christian theology than this. And BTW, prior to the compilation of fossil evidence and the development of dating techniques, many Christians simply chalked up the reality of predation and carnivory to the “Fall of Man”. Well, in the face of modern scientific evidence, good luck to anyone defending that claim.

Forgive me for not accepting a verse from the Book of Job as authoritative. Considering that many Bible scholars don’t agree re. who wrote the manuscripts, the specific date of the manuscripts (within more than a century or two), or if the book itself is allegorical, I’ll take that scripture reference with a salt lick.

“Jonathan may think naturalism is a better explanation for what he sees in the video, but it offers no explanation for what he feels when he watches it, or even why he should feel anything at all.” – RonH

BTW, I would not personally characterize the behaviour of the lions in the video as “evil” any more than the reality that the lions WILL starve to death if it doesn’t get enough to eat. What we see in the video is reality. I am under the impression that Jonathan believes such a format for life is more likely explained by naturalism than being the design of an onmibenevolent God. As far as what “evidence” he might have to hold that belief, I would defer to him.

Your animadversion is gratuitous. An eleemosynary edification of my communiqué would guilelessly connote that your grandiloquent habit of adhibiting Canis Latinicus at every fortuity, is not as imposant as you surmise it is.

“Jehovah’s Witnesses are not allowed to salute the flag of any nation, recite the pledge of allegiance, stand for or sing the national anthem, run for public office, vote, or serve in the armed forces.”

BTW, Jonathan Pearce stated that he was blocking this person from his site

Andy, I am not sure how much time you may have invested re. researching certain beliefs of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I know next to nothing about them – I´ve only met two of them by accident while I was standing outside the Institute where I used to work. They were distributing a pamphlet that included something about the “satanic lie of Evolution” – and the Institute I was standing in front of had a big sign saying “Institute for Evolutionary Biology”, what an awkward moment that was (ok, mostly awkward for them 😉 ).

One belief they hold is they will not accept blood transfusions. I wonder if STM (Skullus Thickness Maximus) would actually instruct a Physician to let one of STM’s immediate family members (assuming they were also a Jehovah’s Witness) bleed to death (in the event of an accident) in accordance with their beliefs rather than to accept a blood transfusion…

Has Dr. Rauser ever directly responded to anything STM (Skullus Thickness Maximus) has posted here recently? I would like to see STM engage Dr. Rauser directly on this website and watch as SMT gets taken apart by a Theologian.

Joseph said : I really painted him into a corner but you yanked the plug just in time to save him from himself

That’s pretty much how things tend to go down with Andy. Don’t worry about it. He’s just an immature person, who doesn’t know when he’s beat. He’ll keep coming, even though you have broken both his legs and his feet. He lives under this illusion, that if you just keep posting as if nothing has happened, nobody will notice. And when you catch him in a lie, he’ll turn on a dime and accuse you of being a liar instead.

Let’s not hijack the thread now. People can go and see the torrents of evidence to show you are both gargantuan trolls. Joseph has been banned from other sites, and John you admittedto me you were amazed I hadn’t banned you because you had been from other sites. This might tell you something about the way you argue.

Indeed, if we would visit one of your Jehovah´s witness kingdom halls and started an argument that Jesus totally didn´t exist, using the “evidence” and “arguments” from the Zeitgeist movie, and would simply repeat our idiotic arguments whenever you correct them – I doubt you would have as much patience with us as Jonathan had with you.

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

I would advise anyone who would like to know whether JohnM´s charges are correct to look up any thread on Jonathan Pearce´s blog where he commented – since what he is doing here is engaging in weapons grade projection.

But unfortunately JohnM has already proven, using YEC logic, that the probability of him or me being right is exactly 50% and cannot possibly change from this value unless we get additional and different opinions about this issue:

We have before us, 6 possibilities, represented by 6 different opinions.

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

Are you serious John? Wow, I was advised to ban you by a good few people very early, but I let you flow. It is no surprise you defend him, neither of you interact with any of the material offered, you ignore or misunderstand basic science, and you remain staunch YECs or evolution deniers in the face of heaps of evidence and argument given to you which you ignore. And on and on.

The thing I really don’t understand, is that the atheist I tend to come across on these blogs, all seem to think, that by pointing out that there’s real evil in creation now, that somehow makes God evil.

Yes, there’s evil in creation. But we don’t live in the garden of Eden, do we?

According to Genesis, the world that we live in, is the product of 1) creation by Good God, 2) corruption by evil god (The god of this world).

Good God explains good. Evil god explains evil. Sin and death entered the world though man. Everything is accounted for in the bible. And therefore Christianity doesn’t have a problem of evil.

Do I believe that God created lions as they are now? No. God looked upon creation and saw that it was good. We.. Us human beings, introduced sin, death and suffering into this world. We are to blame for its current state.

Dr. Rauser attached a link to a paper he wrote that discusses the issue of predation and animal suffering. He addresses the position that predation was caused by the “Fall of Man”. I believe he refers to it as the “Adamic thesis”. You might find this informative:

I had to go to bed before I could finish reading it ( I will finish it later today ). But if you think I’m going to go all “burn the heretic” on Randal, then you’re sadly mistaken. He has his views. I have mine. And that’s fine.

You’re correct, sin certainly did not exist before the fall but death did for animals, unlike man, were not created to live eternally. For instance, regarding the way God made humans, the Bible says: “He has even put eternity into their minds.” Yet, nothing like this is said of animals. —Ecclesiastes 3:11, Byington.

Remember, too, that the Bible emphasizes the distinction between humans and animals. Humans, not animals, were made ‘in the image and likeness of God.’ (Genesis 1:26)

As such, Adam and Eve, as keepers of the animals in Eden, knew very well what death meant because they certainly witnessed their passing. (Genesis 2:15,19,20)

Actually no. My question was : Where are you saying that it ( death ) existed before the fall?

Joseph said : You’re correct, sin certainly did not exist before the fall..

I’m correct? I said that “it did not exist in the world”, as in “not within creation”. That’s not the same as saying, that Sin did not exist at all, prior to the fall.

After all, the snake was lying to Adam and Eve, when it said.. “Surely you shall not die”, was it not ?

Joseph said : As such, Adam and Eve, as keepers of the animals in Eden, knew very well what death meant because they certainly witnessed their passing. (Genesis 2:15,19,20)

I see no death in the verses that you mention. The first time I see death in genesis, is when God gives Adam and Eve skins to “hide” themselves in, which is after the fall, and nature having grown thorns and thistles.

Furthermore, doesn’t the bible tell us that death is the enemy of God? The last enemy to be destroyed? Why would God have included that in the garden of Eden? He looked upon it and said that it was good, did he not?

I. I’m attempting to explicate that Adam and Eve understood what death was because animals die and they certainly must have seen them die during the untold number of years they spent caring for Eden and its animals.

II. I don’t quite follow your objection. Can you please clarify?

III. It appears you’re overlooking two salient facts:

A – Humans, not animals, were made ‘in the image and likeness of God.’ (Genesis 1:26)

B – Regarding the way God made humans, the Bible says: “He has even put eternity into their minds.” Yet, nothing like this is said of animals. —Ecclesiastes 3:11, Byington.

Are you somehow implying that Christ’s ransom sacrifice is meant to grant animals eternal life as well?

Joseph said : Humans, not animals, were made ‘in the image and likeness of God.

Granted. Humans are not animals. But that doesn’t mean, that death was part of the garden of Eden.

Joseph said : Are you somehow implying that Christ’s ransom sacrifice is meant to grant animals eternal life as well?

No.

Joseph said : What particular scripture are you referring to?

1 Corinthians 15:26The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

Joseph said : I’m attempting to explicate that Adam and Eve understood what death was because animals die and they certainly must have seen them die during the untold number of years they spent caring for Eden and its animals.

I see no reason why death would have been part of the garden of Eden, based on the scriptures you have provided.

Also, keep in mind that the Jews sacrificed animals to atone for sin. Why? Because death is the wages of sin (Romans 6:23). Sin and death are two sides of the same coin.

Furthermore, Romans 5:12 doesn’t say that death entered the world of man, though a man. It says that sin and death entered the world, though a man.

II. If your statement is accurate and (I) is also true, why would God not restore animals to eternal life?

III. Correct, death, brought upon the human race by Adam’s transgression, “will be no more.” (Ro 5:12; Re 21:3, 4) This does not mean, however, that man will be imbued with immortality. Should anyone in the recreated Paradise ever rebel against Jehovah God, they will be executed. (Isaiah 65:20; http://bit.ly/11Hg741 pp. 12-14)

Joseph said : If not, that supposes animals were created to be eternal.

Everything was, including human beings. No death and suffering was part of the design.

Sin and death entered the world, though a man.

Joseph said : If your statement is accurate and is also true, why would God not restore animals to eternal life?

Isaiah 11 : 6-9The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the cobra’s den, and the young child will put its hand into the viper’s nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

Joseph said : This does not mean, however, that man will be imbued with immortality.

John 3:36Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life

Joseph said : Should anyone in the restored Paradise ever rebel against Jehovah God again, they will be executed.

This is especially true given that the only ones vested with immortality are Christ Jesus and the relatively few anointed Christians called to reign with Christ in the heavens. (1Pe 1:3, 4) The promise is that they share with Christ in the likeness of his resurrection. (Ro 6:5) Thus, as in the case of their Lord and Head, the anointed members of the Christian congregation who die faithful receive a resurrection to immortal spirit life, so that “this which is mortal puts on immortality.” (1Co 15:50-54)

As an FYI, Joseph O Polanco boldly stated on Jonathan Pearce’s blog that scripture is not meant to be interpreted. He clearly stated that scripture was intended to be adhered to. Now, let him explain himself to you if he may:

“There’s your error. The Bible, like any authoritative enchiridion, was not designed to be interpreted but to be adhered to.” – Joseph O Polanco

“Every text is interpreted when read. But there are limits to, what a text can be interpreted to mean. You cannot just interpret a text to mean whatever you like.” – JohnM

I hope this was not intended as a defence of Joseph O Polanco’s declaration. If a person were to follow verbatim what is written in scripture without there being interpretation, how would a person know if the scripture was intended to be allegorical vs. to be taken literally? Do you really believe Jesus literally wanted every person to pluck out their own eye or chop off their own hand if those instruments led them to commit a sin? Seriously?

There MUST be correct interpretation. This is really not worth arguing about (imo).

If a person were to follow verbatim what is written in scripture without there being interpretation, how would a person know if the scripture was intended to be allegorical vs. to be taken literally? For example, do you really believe Jesus literally wanted every person to pluck out their own eye or chop off their own hand (or foot) if those instruments led them to commit a sin?

James said : If a person were to follow verbatim what is written in scripture without there being interpretation, how would a person know if the scripture was intended to be allegorical vs. to be taken literally?

You always use the bible to interpret the bible. When it’s a parable, the bible tells you so. When it’s a prophecy, the bible tells you so.

James said : For example, do you really believe Jesus literally wanted every person to pluck out their own eye or chop off their own hand…

He said that it was the better solution in some cases. But it applies to everything.. If something brings you to fall, get rid of it.

“You always use the bible to interpret the bible. When it’s a parable, the bible tells you so. When it’s a prophecy, the bible tells you so.” – JohnM

Not true re. allegory. Bible scholars have debated for centuries if the Book of Job (for example) references a literal character (i.e. Job) and literal events or if the story is allegorical.

“He said that it was the better solution in some cases. But it applies to everything.. If something brings you to fall, get rid of it.” – JohnM

Have you ever looked upon a woman (other than your wife) with lust? Have you ever looked upon a material possession that your neighbor or someone else owned and wished you owned it instead (i.e. to covet). If so, please proceed to pluck your eye out. To demonstrate your faithfulness to us here, we would like to see a before-and-after photo of you… and your disembodied eye.

(8) If, then, your hand or your foot is making you stumble, cut it off and throw it away from you; it is finer for you to enter into life maimed or lame than to be thrown with two hands or two feet into the everlasting fire. (9) Also, if your eye is making you stumble, tear it out and throw it away from you; it is finer for you to enter one?eyed into life than to be thrown with two eyes into the fiery Ge?hen?na.

Well, JohnM. Have you have ever committed an act of covetousness or lust etc. in your life? If so, Jesus appears to CLEARLY direct you to remove the instrument (i.e. hand or foot or eye). Now, did you ever commit such a sin? If so, get that eye out or cut off a hand or foot… and please show us photographs as a testament to your faith…

“Which is why it’s so important to read what the Bible actually says for oneself and to make sure one’s beliefs are in harmony with its entirety, not just bits and pieces of it.” – Joseph O Polanco

Okay, Joseph.

Joseph Ratzinger is a Bible scholar. He has devoted more than 60 years of his life to studying the Bible. He can read both Ancient Greek and biblical Hebrew fluently. Now, here is a Bible verse from the New World Translation that I would like you to read:

(18) Also,I say to you, You are Peter, and on this rock?mass I will build my congregation, and the gates of Ha?des will not overpower it. (19) I will give you the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, and whatever you may bind on earth will be the thing bound in the heavens, and whatever you may loose on earth will be the thing loosed in the heavens.”

Joseph Ratzinger has read these verses. He LITERALLY believes that Christ conferred special authority specifically upon Peter to be the head of the Church. Now, do you AGREE? If not, why not? If you disagree, is it because you INTERPRET these verses differently than Joseph Ratzinger does.

James said : Joseph Ratzinger has read these verses. He LITERALLY believes that Christ conferred special authority specifically upon Peter to be the head of the Church. Now, do you AGREE? If not, why not? If you disagree, is it because you INTERPRET these verses differently than Joseph Ratzinger does.

Pope Benedict has no clue what he’s talking about. Peter was apostle to the circumcised. Paul was the apostle to the gentiles. ( Galatians 2:8 ) A gentile church of Rome would have been built upon Paul, not Peter.

Also, the Vatican means soothsayer. It’s an old graveyard for pagan Roman priest, as is clearly seen in the catacombs beneath. There’s no chance that an executed Peter would have been allowed to be buried there. It would have been like giving a traitor a royal burial. And there’s no chance that the the disciples would have allowed him to be buried on a pagan burial ground for Roman priest. Peter was a Jew. And Jews have their own burial grounds, you know..

The Roman catholic church is not built upon Simon Peter, but upon Simon Magus. He’s the only guy who could have been buried on that hill, as Magus means mage or sorcerer.

In other words, you INTERPRET the verses of Matthew 16:18-19 differently than Ratzinger and his predecessors and the Holy See etc. all do, right? And of course, your INTERPRETATION of those verses is correct, right?

JohnM, Joseph Ratzinger’s knowledge of scripture and Christian theology far surpasses your own. Your peurile comments are akin to what one might find in a sophomoric tract that claims the RCC is the whore of Babylon.

No. I’m just reading what the text says.. That Jesus would build his church upon Jews, which the disciples were. And that Peter would be the apostle of the circumcised.

James said : claims the RCC is the whore of Babylon.

Well you go ahead and match the description if you like. It’s pretty clear.. I mean who would deny that Rome is built on 7 hills? Who would deny that the pope claims to be God? Who would deny that the pope claims to be the holy father, a title reserved for God? Who would deny, that the Roman Catholic Church is drunk with the blood of the saints? Who would deny that they dress in purple and scarlet? Who would deny that the Roman catholic church has been in bed with the leaders of the world since its early days?

Actually, Vatican hill is to the west of the seven hills of Rome, seperated from the heart of ancient rome by a river.

Who would deny that the pope claims to be God?

The pope and every other Catholic.

Who would deny that the pope claims to be the holy father, a title reserved for God?

Citation needed.

Who would deny that they dress in purple and scarlet?

Actually, the liturgical colors include not only purple (it´s actually violet, but who cares) and scarlet but also white, black and green, since Innocent III standardized the system for liturgical colors.

But why let facts get in the way of a perfectly good conspiracy theory…

“That the apostles did not understand Jesus’ statement to signify that Peter was the rock-mass is evident from the fact that they later disputed about who seemed to be the greatest among them. (Mr 9:33-35; Lu 22:24-26) There would have been no basis for such disputing had Peter been given the primacy as the rock-mass on which the congregation was to be built. The Scriptures clearly show that as foundation stones, all the apostles are equal. All of them, including Peter, rest upon Christ Jesus as the foundation cornerstone. (Eph 2:19-22; Re 21:2, 9-14) Peter himself identified the rock-mass (pe?tra) on which the congregation is built as being Christ Jesus. (1Pe 2:4-8) Similarly, the apostle Paul wrote: “For they [the Israelites] used to drink from the spiritual rock-mass that followed them, and that rock-mass meant the Christ.” (1Co 10:4) On at least two occasions and in two different locations the Israelites received a miraculous provision of water from a rock-mass. (Ex 17:5-7; Nu 20:1-11) Therefore, the rock-mass as a source of water, in effect, followed them. The rock-mass itself was evidently a pictorial, or symbolic, type of Christ Jesus, who said to the Jews: “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.”—Joh 7:37.

It is also of interest that Augustine (354-430 C.E.), usually referred to as “Saint Augustine,” at one time believed that Peter was the rock-mass but later changed his view. Lange’s Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Mt 16:18, ftn, p. 296) quotes Augustine as saying: “The rock is not so named from Peter, but Peter from the rock (non enim a Petro petra, sed Petrus a petra), even as Christ is not so called after the Christian, but the Christian after Christ. For the reason why the Lord says, ‘On this rock I will build my church,’ is that Peter had said: ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ On this rock, which thou hast confessed, says he, I will build my church. For Christ was the rock (petra enim erat Christus), upon which also Peter himself was built; for other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.”—Translated and edited by P. Schaff, 1976.” – http://bit.ly/11XR1On

As you can see, then, Ratzinger’s understanding of the passage in question exists in a vacuum for it is inconsistent with Peter’s own estimation of himself and recorded history.

You wasted a lot of keystrokes. I am not a Catholic apologist. The point of my original comment was that scripture is interpreted differently by different Bible scholars. There is no unanimous interpretation of all scripture throughout Christendom. For example, Bible scholars have debated for centuries whether or not the Book of Job is allegorical or if it was a factual account of a real person.

You cannot be this dense. I clearly pointed out that different Bible scholars may read the same passages of select scripture yet come away with markedly different understandings of it. I only used Ratzinger as an example. I could just as easily have used William Lane Craig as an example of someone who may have a different understanding of select verses of scripture than other Bible scholars. For example, Craig is a Molinist who understands Matthew 11:23 differently than a Calvinist might understand it.

You have steadfastly AVOIDED my point. You said scripture was not intended to be interpreted but adhered to. In the absence of a universally correct understanding of scripture, conflict ensues. Well, guess what. There is no unanimous interpretation of all scripture throughout Christendom. As another example, Bible scholars have debated for centuries whether or not the Book of Job is allegorical or if it was a factual account of a real person.

If Catholics, Molinists, Protestants, Evangelicals, Born Agains, Mormons, Anglicans, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Non-Denominationalists, Universalists, Baptists, Charismatics, Seventh Day Adventists, Calvinists, etc., etc., etc. are not Christians, in what way is there “no unanimous interpretation of all scripture throughout Christendom”?

“If Catholics, Molinists, Protestants, Evangelicals, Born Agains, Mormons, Non-Denominationalists, Universalists, Baptists, Charismatics, Seventh Day Adventists, Calvinists, etc., etc., etc. are not Christians, in what way is there “no unanimous interpretation of all scripture throughout Christendom”?”

(8) If, then, your hand or your foot is making you stumble, cut it off and throw it away from you; it is finer for you to enter into life maimed or lame than to be thrown with two hands or two feet into the everlasting fire. (9) Also, if your eye is making you stumble, tear it out and throw it away from you; it is finer for you to enter one?eyed into life than to be thrown with two eyes into the fiery Ge?hen?na.

Joseph O Polanco, have you have ever committed an act of covetousness or lust etc.? If so, Jesus appears to CLEARLY direct you to remove the instrument (i.e. hand or foot or eye). Now, did you ever commit such a sin? If so, get that eye out or cut off a hand or a foot… and please show us photographs as a testament to your faith…

In other words, Joseph O Polanco, your INTERPRETATION of that passage of Matthew 18:8-9 from the New World Translation Bible is that Christ did not literally want you to chop off a hand or foot or remove an eye upon the instance that one of those instruments made you stumble. How interesting, Joseph O Polanco.

The following excerpt is verbatim from http://www.jw.org re. “Keys to understanding the Bible” and “Things you don’t need:

You know, debating you is like trying to play chess with a pigeon; it knocks the pieces over, takes a hot, steamy dump on the board, farts in your face and flies back to its flock to celebrate victory with all its friends.

BTW, his contact info. is on that linkedin page (in case someone wants to call him). I do wonder how his employer’s IT department would feel about him spamming his religious beliefs for so many hours throughout the day.

BTW, this guy apparently was banned by another site (if you read through the petition process in the link it appears that Atheist Republic banned him):

The actual name of his employer appears to be “Combined insurance”. The reference to “Greater New York City Area Insurance” apparently is a general description of his field and geographic location. There is a personal phone number and e-mail address on the linkedin page (toward the bottom).

Ezekiel 14 : 12-14The word of the Lord came to me: “Son of man, if a country sins against me by being unfaithful and I stretch out my hand against it to cut off its food supply and send famine upon it and kill its people and their animals, even if these three men – Noah, Daniel and Job – were in it, they could save only themselves by their righteousness, declares the Sovereign Lord.

So, your INTERPRETATION of that passage leads you to believe Job was a real person, right? Your INTERPRETATION…

FWIW, many modern Bible scholars believe the Book of Job is filled with poetic allegory rather than being literally true… as many believe the Exodus account is largely allegorical as opposed to being literally true. I guess they have a different INTERPRETATION of the scriptures from those who take them literally.

The whole point of my original post was not to debate if Job was real or not, but INTERPRETATION.

Remember, evil is all that which contravenes God’s just norms. Since God will not eliminate free will there will always be the possibility that someone down the line may try to rebel against God the way Adam and Eve did (Remember they were perfect). If you’re asserting that God cannot execute these then we’re all doomed. Do you really think this reasoning fits with God’s eternal beneficent purposes for man?

God’s justice demands that sinners be punished, sometimes even with death. If no one will be able to die after Christ’s Millenial Reign, per your understanding, evildoers will flourish and there will be nothing God could do to execute them because, per your view, death is no more. Follow?

Well to some extent. But what makes you conclude, that people will be as wicked then as they are now? Does the bible not say, that we will be with a new resurrection body? After all, our enemy is the flesh. If you remove that, you’re back at the garden of eden.. And the question then becomes.. What would Genesis have been like, without the snake? After all, it took a snake to get to the fall right?

i. The issue is free will. Remember, Adam and Eve were created perfect, sinless. Yet, nothing stopped them from abusing their free will and rebelling against God. Jesus, the last Adam, could have done the same. (1 Cor 15:45)

The difference between Adam’s rebellion and Jesus’ loyalty was not a matter of their design. They were both perfect, sinless men.

The difference, then, was that Jesus loved Jehovah God while Adam didn’t. It’s that simple.

ii. What prevented Satan from surreptitiously employing any other animal to captivate Eve’s attention? http://bit.ly/10c1msy

JohnG said : Does not the bible say, “The soul that sinneth it shall die”?

Ezekiel 18:20The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.

In biblical terminology the word soul can refer to several things. Reading the context, it’s clearly that this instance it’s referring to a living human being.

And the death referred to, is the first death, not the second death. Otherwise we would all be throw into the lake of fire, as all have fallen short of the glory of God.

JohnG said : And by believing in eternal souls, wouldn’t that be believing in Satan’s, “Ye shall not surely die”?

Every human die, the first death. What Satan said, is a lie, no matter how you look at it.

“The passage is symbolic, as much of the book of Revelation is. Souls = dead persons. They are Christian martyrs. Under the altar speaks of their sacrifice in bloody death. See Lev.4:7. And their cry for vengeance is likewise symbolic in meaning. Thus the passage is similar to Gen.4:10 that says, “the voice of thy brother’s (Abel) blood cries to me from the ground”

In this case, soul clearly means, “them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held”. The saints.. The ones who died preaching the gospel.. Who are now dead.. Yet clearly.. Have not ceased to exist.

The reason you should fear God above man is because God (according to the bible) has the power of resurrection. So death is temporary to those who belong to Him. Thus, if you do not belong to God, death is permanent. God can extinguish permanently.

No. The first death, the one we refer to as death in general, is just a waiting position, until judgement.

Revelation 20 : 12-14And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death.

How can the Hades and the Sea give up the dead, to be judged, if they ceased to exist upon death?

Hebrews 9:27It is appointed for man to die once, and then to facee judgment.

How can people face judgement after death, if they cease to exist upon death?

2 Corinthians 5:10For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

Matthew 25:32All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.

Acts 10:42He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one whom God appointed as judge of the living and the dead.

[[Let me get this right.. so now you’re saying, that they cease to exist, but continue to exist, in the mind of God?]]

The promise to the believer is resurrection, so God must “know” the person he has promised life to.

[[Hebrews, Matthew, Acts, 2 Corinthians, Revelation.]]

They all support what the Old Testament taught – conditionalism.

[[False. Paul makes it very clear. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. You’re speaking against scripture.]]

Who are the “we” that he speaks of? He is writing to, “To the church of God in Corinth”

As for Matthew 25, here is what Scofield said

“This judgment is to be distinguished from the judgment of the great white throne. Here there is no resurrection; the persons judged are living nations; no books are opened; three classes are present, sheep, goats, and brethren; the time is at the return of Christ ( Matthew 25:31 ); and the scene is on the earth. All these particulars are in contrast with Revelation 20:11-15 .The test in this judgment is the treatment accorded by the nations to those whom Christ here call “my brethren.” These “brethren” are the Jewish Remnant who will have preached the Gospel of the kingdom to all nations during the tribulation.”

JohnG said : I don’t read anywhere where unbelievers are present at that judgment.

We can do verses about unbelievers as well, if you like

Psalm 14:1-5The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good. The Lord looks down from heaven on all mankind to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. All have turned away, all have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one. Do all these evildoers know nothing? They devour my people as though eating bread; they never call on the Lord. But there they are, overwhelmed with dread, for God is present in the company of the righteous

“…The Lord looks down from heaven on all mankind to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. All have turned away, all have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.”

You told me you came to Christ because YOU chose to believe. This verse says ALL have turned away, none do good, all are corrupt. This refutes your “free will” bullshit quite succinctly so thanks for quoting it.

Romans 1:20For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

The bible refers to “unbelievers” as fools, because they are denying what is clearly seen in creation.

Romans 1:25They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator, who is forever praised. Amen.

But it´s cute to see JohnM and Joseph in the same thread – they both believe with utmost certainty that their interpretations of the Bible are not only correct, but obviously correct. And they both have the exact same “explanation” for why anyone could disagree with them about Bible interpretations: the big boogeyman aka Satan. You can´t make this shit up.

Andy, isn’t the “link” between Joseph O Polanco and JohnM and Joe G apparent by now…

Joseph O Polanco’s comment that the Bible wasn’t meant to be interpreted but to be adhered to is perhaps the most indefensible opinion I have ever heard an apologist make. When the New World Translation Bible was translated by a body of scholars from ancient Classical Hebrew, Koine Greek, and Old Aramaic biblical texts, the translation could not have been done without some level of interpretation of some of the older texts. Those languages do not translate perfectly into English without SOME level of interpretation.

BTW, note how JohnM offers his INTERPRETATION of those verses he cites… and the certainty with which he declares his interpretation to be correct. Imagine that…

If so, why do so many Bible scholars disagree re. their INTERPRETATION of different passages? Are you supposing the Holy Spirit directed YOU to the truth whilst all those who INTERPRET scripture differently are being DECEIVED?

“The passage is symbolic, as much of the book of Revelation is. Souls = dead persons. They are Christian martyrs. Under the altar speaks of their sacrifice in bloody death. See Lev.4:7. And their cry for vengeance is likewise symbolic in meaning. Thus the passage is similar to Gen.4:10 that says, “the voice of thy brother’s (Abel) blood cries to me from the ground”

You forgot the last and most important part in understanding that scripture.

Eccesiastes 9 : 5-6For the living know that they will die, but the dead know nothing; they have no further reward, and even their name is forgotten. Their love, their hate and their jealousy have long since vanished; never again will they have a part in anything that happens under the sun.

Not at all. The reason why the dead know nothing is that they are sleeping in the ground:

Daniel 12 : 2-3 Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever.

HA! I’m an atheist fool. I’m just trying to show how weak your hermeneutics are.

BTW, why exactly do you think this verse indicates that conditionalism is not true biblically? I cannot for the life of me see why. Also, you really need to study things like sheol, nephesh, hades, etc.. You need to check every occurrence of those words and see how they are used and the contexts. The above verse is perfectly fine with conditionalism/annihilation.

The bible teaches man’s inability. You go against that and feel that you can ON your own accord come to Christ apart from election despite the fact that the “natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God”

I’m sorry John, but you have been feed lies by the Calvinists. Once saved, always saved, is falsehood. And had you actually studied your bible, you would have exposed their lies long ago:

Colossians 1 : 21-23Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation, IF you continue in your faith, established and firm, and do not move from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant.

“And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand”

1. Did Christ give eternal life or temporal life based on what a man can do? 2. Is salvation based on works or the finished work of Christ? 3. To whom did the Father give the son? 4. Who can pluck them out of his hand?

Anybody can take a verse and interpret it out of context. Col 1:21-23 is also from the same apostle who made this abundantly clear in Romans 9.

JohnG said : Did Christ give eternal life or temporal life based on what a man can do?

You’re getting too far ahead of yourself. We have yet to appear before the judgement seat of Christ. We first have to suffer the first death. Clearly we do not have eternal life yet. And we can still plug ourselves out.

Matthew 10:33But whoever disowns me before others, I will disown before my Father in heaven.

If your Calvinist doctrine was true, that verse would not be found in the bible.

JohnG said : Is salvation based on works or the finished work of Christ?

The head of the snake is crushed. That part is finished. Are we saved by works? No of course not. We are saved by grace. But we must grow in the lord, and allow him to do good works though us, if we are to keep the faith.

Colossians 1 : 9 – 12 We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives, so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

James 2:14-17 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 1Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

Matthew 7:19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

Matthew 6:14-15For IF you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but IF you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

Romans 8:13For IF you live according to the flesh, you will die; but IF by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

1 Corinthians 15:1-2By this gospel you are saved, IF you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

Galatians 6:9Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest IF we do not give up.

Matthew 24 :13And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But he that endures unto the end, shall be saved.

Is it something that we do in our own power? No, it is something that we do by the grace of God, so that no man can boast.

You are a pretty shallow guy aren’t ya? Matthew 6 is still on Old Testament ground and Matthew 24 is talking about one who endures to the end of the tribulation. None of this has to do with Paul’s revelation of the Mystery.

Romans 8 is not about salvation at all, but rather if you live after the flesh, you will die. Also, I noticed the verses I brought to your attention you simply blindly ignore without any commentary whatsoever while continuing to spout off your proof texts while completely ignoring the passages about God’s sovereignty and man’s inability and election. You should read Martin Luther’s “The Bondage of the Will” or Arthur Pink’s, ‘The Sovereignty of God”, because you seem to think you are saved by what you do despite the lip service you give to grace. If you think that you can stay saved by what you “do”, than Jesus died in vain (biblically speaking).

1 Cor 15:1-2, This passage says nothing about losing salvation. The whole chapter is about the resurrection and some in Corinth who didn’t even believe in the resurrection. Romans 9:6, “So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy.”

Nope, both of you are telling us that the Bible is “clear” in it´s teachings, self-sufficient and infallible – and you both tell us that we have so many different christian denominations because Satan misleads people. So, do you think that the Bible clearly teaches that the earth cannot be older than the geneaologies leading back to Adam indicate (i.e. a few thousand years), or not? If you disagree, and we take both of your comments at face value, it clearly follows that either you, or JohnM (or both) are being misled by Satan.

ii. To automatically assume someone who misunderstands the Bible is being misled by Satan himself is uncalled for. This is especially true since many have never studied the Bible for themselves much less even read it completely.

I´m not asking for a specific answer, I´m asking whether the Bible clearly teaches that the age of the earth cannot be older than what is implied by the geneaologies going back to the creation week (let´s say something between 6000 and 12000 years) or whether it would also be compatible with an earth that is some billions of years old? It can´t be both, and both you and JohnM have read the Bible. So what is it? Is one of you (or both) being misled by Satan or is the Bible not clear about that? And if it is the latter, what else is it not clear about?

The days of the creation week can be read in many ways, IMO. I have no problem with that. The earth could be old.

The time between Adam and Jesus, is very limited, IMO. I don’t see how one can challenge that.

My biggest problem with most old earth positions, is that they ignore scripture and introduce death into the world, when the bible clearly states that it entered the world though a Man. The first man. Adam.

The time between Adam and Jesus, is very limited, IMO. I don’t see how one can challenge that.

My biggest problem with most old earth positions, is that they ignore scripture and introduce death into the world, when the bible clearly states that it entered the world though a Man.

And Joseph is cool with an earth that is over four billion years old. So, since both of you have read the Bible and both of you are convinced that it is clear in it´s teachings and infallible and since both of you believe that Christian leaders who preach / teach that Evolution is compatible with the Bible (for example) are misled by Satan. this leaves us with the question – is one of you being misled by Satan or is the Bible not clear in it´s teachings?

Well the bible itself says 6 days + rest. I think that can hardly be clearer.

And to Joseph it seems to be completely clear that the Bible doesn´t imply six literal days in any way, shape or form. There are not many options to explain this – he´s a fool, or misled by Satan, or the Bible is not clear about that – which one is it?

Geeez, man. Lighten up. I am unaware how extensive his Bible studies has been nor how long he has been studying the Bible. I don’t even know if he’s read it in full. As such, I’m more than happy to give him the benefit of the doubt.

More than likely yes. I cannot state so with absolute certainty because everything is contingent on the kind of person he is and his motivations for studying the Bible.

There are many, for instance, who have the Bible committed to memory in its entirety, yet, they use this knowledge to deceive and/or harm others.

The point is, nothing in the Bible nullifies a person’s free will, it doesn’t transform them into phlegmatic automatons. What they choose to do with that knowledge is always up to them.

How is it, then, that so many people how have led horrific lives have been able to transform themselves into these amazingly wonderful people after having studied the Bible? Simple, they chose to use that knowledge to develop a close personal relationship with their loving Creator, Jehovah God: http://bit.ly/135BKl7

Oh, and JohnM, I apologize for speaking about you as if you weren’t here. I mean no offense 🙂

I Edom is modern day Jordan. Like it or not, biblical scholars agree on that point and like it or not it is inhabited.

II “….none of the traditional starting dates-605 B.c., 597 B.c., or 587/86 B.c.- provides a time period of exactly seventy years.” Loring W. Batten, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah

And there are those that think Jeremiah was back dated-history rather than prediction.

III Sorry-have to go with the ‘vague’ thing. And empires fall-even those that seem permanent. Who could hav4e guessed that, eh?

IV Out of all the bitching and moaning against Tyre by jewish ‘prophets’ a (sorta) lucky hit (and again the charge of possible back dating). Who could have guessed that an island city state would have it’s building stones chucked into the sea? LOL

If this is the kind of crap your faith rests on I’ll see you at next years American Atheists conference.

I “The Edomites’ original country, according to the Tanakh, stretched from the Sinai peninsula as far as Kadesh Barnea. Southward it reached as far as Eilat, which was the seaport of Edom…” Wiki Are you seriously suggesting all of that area is uninhabited now?

This is easily accessible information. You only embarrass yourself further by your refusal to accept facts.

II See I.

III Irrelevant, fool. You seem to be incapable of aruing to the point and constantly try to shift the topic.

IV As are your claims of judeo/christian prophecies being ‘fulfilled’. I thought that point was completely obvious.

“…Aqaba has been an inhabited settlement since 4000 BC profiting from its strategic location at the junction of trading routes between Asia and Africa. The early settlement was presumably Edomite in ancient times. It was a centre of the Edomites, and then of the Arab Nabataeans, during the first century B.C. who populated the region extensively. The oldest known text in Arabic alphabet is an inscription found in Jabal Ram 50 km (31 mi) east of Aqaba…..’ Wiki

And WTF dos the 7th century have to do with it being inhabited, n00bie n00b?

You could save yourself so much embarrassment with a few mouse clicks.

Derp a derp derpity derp. I wish I were in the room with you to see you hit yourself on the head with a hammer after every sentence you type. It would be terrible amusing. They must put you in a protective helmet every morning.

What I am doing, bonehead, is giving you easily accessible information, that is not disputed, showing Aqaba/Eilat has been inhabited since 4,000 BCE and has been continuously inhabited since then which makes a mockery of your ‘divine prophecy’. ‘Uninhabited’, dipshit, means uninhabited. A centre of the Edomites’ means precisely that.

‘Total eradication’ apparently means something else on planet n00bie n00b. And it doesn’t matter who inhabited it after they did nor does it matter when your failed ‘prophecy’ was written.

He is simply a fool who has presupposed truth values and then scrabbled around to confirm them with the most intolerable of weak evidence.

Poor.

Incidentally, I did like this moment on my blog to Joe O P, in answer to his accusation that “Your second video is equally specious as a fallacious argumentum falsam analogiam” :

Look, if you want to argue in Latin then let’s do it, I have a qualification in the subject. However, it is really quite unnecessary because you are only using it as a rather silly rhetorical technique to make you appear more intelligent than you are. It is so crass.

By all means, continue, but let it be known that you only make yourself appear like more of a douche every time you do.

Also, if you are going to use Latin, do it properly.

As far as I know, and correct me if I am wrong, but analogia, -ae is a group 1 feminine noun and the adjective falsus, falsa, falsum should agree in the accusative case, which is what you have use, in the feminine.

Which means it should be falsam analogiam.

I might be wrong. Either way, stop using pseudo intellectual bullshit to make yourself sound important.

After reading the book and reading your blogs for the last year or so and witnessing your professional and thoughtful interaction and demeanor with others, I have to agree. That sets you apart, at least in my eyes.

In my view there’s room for seeing things differently. We are after all different people. And we all have the wisdom and insight that each of us has. So naturally, there will be different views floating around.

The same was true of the disciples in the early days, when they discussed what it meant to be a spiritual jew ( a Christian ) vs being a Jew in flesh and blood. Should Christians be circumcised? Did the law of Moses apply to them? Or were they dead to the law and under grace now?

I myself is in the young earth camp. But I find it hard to be upset by people who believe in a very old earth. My only interest is, how such views may effect theological doctrines of Christianity and the reading of the gospel.

So, to summarize: – you and Joseph do believe that an age of the earth of either a few thousand years or a few billion years are both acceptable views for “true Christians”. – you and Joseph do believe that evolution of all life from a common ancestor is not an acceptable view (Joseph even goes as far as saying that he considers Christians who have this view as Atheists). – Ken Ham and his staff from Answers in Genesis agree with both of you on the latter point, but often refer to an old earth as a satanic lie and consider that a view that cannot possibly be reconciled with the Bible and is completely unacceptable for Christians.

Joseph, Ken and you have all read the Bible extensively and consider it to be infallible and clear in what it teaches. You might want to reconsider that last point.

It does require insight and wisdom, to be able to navigate certain parts of the bible. And I think that’s where your problems arises. You’re attempting to read the bible with modern glasses, with zero culture understanding and with less that adequate background knowledge. And I’ve seen many examples where you guys do not even understanding the common terminology used in the bible.

[[It does require insight and wisdom, to be able to navigate certain parts of the bible]]

And this effects how one interprets the bible right? Thus, it is a matter of interpretation despite your former remark which contradicts yourself. Does Joe, Randal and WLC not have insight and wisdom? Because they understand it differently than you. If it is “clear” than it does not require much insight.

We have before us, 6 possibilities, represented by 6 different opinions. 1: The Informed Opinion 2: The Uninformed Opinion 3: The Expert Opinion 4: The Amateur Opinion 5: The Consensus Opinion 6: The Doctors Opinion What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

I have just interpreted this sentence to mean, that Andy is Anti-gay and a hateful bigot. Why? Because clearly that’s the interrelation I prefer. And therefore it is a valid interpretation, of what he said, right?

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

And in case you have’t figured it out yet, it’s intended to show the weaknesses of probability.

So your point is, that the reliability of differing opinions can always be exactly modelled by a fair dice. So if we have six differing opinions about a Bible verse, including one from someone who knows next to nothing about the Bible, your comment:

We have before us, 6 possibilities, represented by 6 different opinions.

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

means that all opinions are equally likely to be accurate and we could just roll a dice to randomly select one of them. And if we get 14 additional opinions, we just need a 20 sided dice. And if all start agreeing on the same opinion, this opinion magically becomes infallible (until someone starts disagreeing again). You might want to reconsider that.

Andy said : And if all start agreeing on the same opinion, this opinion magically becomes infallible

If you have a dice where all the sides have 1 eye. Then what are the odds of throwing one eye with the dice?

Also, when you throw a dice, you assume that it’s going to land on a side. That may actually not be the case. It could land on a flat corner. Or it could get lost in space before it landed anywhere.

Furthermore, you don’t consider thing such as the dice having been worn in a certain way.

Probability is a simplified reality, when you only consider the factors that you consider important. And in most cases, you cannot factor in everything. How could you possible think of all the different factors that may effect the outcome?

Andy said : So if we have six differing opinions about a Bible verse, including one from someone who knows next to nothing about the Bible, your comment means that all opinions are equally likely to be accurate

Only a fool would use probability to determine what opinion most accurately reflects the bible. A smart person would be looking at the opinion themselves.

Just like a smart person would ignore “The Uninformed Opinion” being one out of 6 possibilities, and look at the opinions themselves instead.

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

Using your own criteria, becoming an expert in biblical studies, classics and ancient history + researching the relevant Bible verses for the interpretation in question for years would result in a probability of your interpretation being accurate of one divided by the number of different interpretations.

[[I’ve quoted many verses from the bible, that completely destroys the doctrines invented by John Calvin]]

You quoted verses you don’t understand, Greek works you failed to take into account and dispensations you have no clue about. II Tim tells you to “rightly divide the word of truth”, but instead you have no clue and try to lump dispensations together and think the Old Testament = Paul’s revelation of the Mystery.

And before I answer anymore quote mines of yours, perhaps you should address the myriads of verses I pointed you to and still have not even said anything?

But as I said, “world” does not mean all without exception, but “all without distinction”.

[[He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.]]

Just out of curiosity John, what do you think re the Bible and young-earth or old-earth creationism? I hate to agree with JohnM but this is a point where I think (based on very little knowledge about biblical hermeneutics) that he´s actually right – young-earth creationism follows from a natural reading of the text.

Well I’m in the young earth camp all right. Numbers? I’m not sure.. And of course I think I’m right. Hehe. What else can you expect from a “fundamentalist”?

But on the other hand, I realize that I could be wrong. So I have respect for the old earth position, as long as people don’t “sell out their theology” in an attempt to be “loved by the world”, so to speak.

Well, the AiG folks and most other YEC organizations do strongly believe that all forms of OEC – from gap creationism over day-age creationism to progressive creationism – are selling out their theology (at least in the sense that they stop considering the Bible to be the ultimate authority in all matters it speaks of). And I actually do agree with them on that.

Well one of my debating tactics is to try and not associate myself with groups, and thereby be a moving target, that people can’t really pin down, hehe. But I will say that I have a lot of sympathy for the folks at AIG.

And let me let you in on a little secret.. My biggest problem with the theory of macro evolution, is what such a method of creation, says about the creator. In my view, the strongest attack that can be made on OEC, is Christopher Hitchen’s “Heaven watches with folded arms”.

It’s much easier just being called an idiot for being a YEC, than trying to explain that one 😛

So you’re offering me a truce for slandering the ID crowd, huh? Who do you think I am? Judas ? :p

I don’t have hard feelings about the ID movement. I think some of what they do is brilliant. And I’m a huge fan of the “no intelligence allowed” movie. Maybe because it confirms my own personal bias hehe.

But I don’t really understand the lawsuits in the big US of A. In my country they still teach Christianity in school, and the students read the bible in class. But since most teachers are not real Christians, as in real believers, but more or less half-hearted religious people.. It’s a bit like getting a vaccination against it.. You get a little bit, and then that keeps you from getting the real deal. It’s lukewarm and the worst of both worlds. Better to be either hot or cold, according to the bible 😉

So from my perspective, Christianity in schools, when done wrong as it most often is, is a huge minus.

1. No. 2. A requirement for “slander” is that the statement in question is demonstrably false (and if it is about written instead of spoken word – it would be “libel”, not “slander”)

I think some of what they do is brilliant.

Well, I´ve seen time and again how much (or rather how little) you know about the scientific issues in question, and therefore, I honestly couldn´t care less whether you think their plagiarism of YEC arguments is brillant or not.

My biggest problem with the theory of macro evolution, is what such a method of creation, says about the creator.

Yeah, that does cause many problems for theism, but these problems are usually already caused by acknowledging that the earth is indeed ancient without accepting common descent (like excessive and gratuitous animal suffering – which is why WLC tries to deny that any non-human animal can indeed suffer).

In my view, the strongest attack that can be made on OEC, is Christopher Hitchen’s “Heaven watches with folded arms”.

For OEC (most forms of which deny common descent), it´s even worse than that – because they must propose that heaven is not actually “watching with folded arms”, but rather that God is constantly causing miracles to create millions of new species only to watch them go extinct.

[[And let me let you in on a little secret.. My biggest problem with the theory of macro evolution, is what such a method of creation, says about the creator. In my view, the strongest attack that can be made on OEC, is Christopher Hitchen’s “Heaven watches with folded arms”.]]

Thank you JohnM for your honesty in telling us that. I appreciate that. You have just earned a modicum of respect from me.

[[ what do you think re the Bible and young-earth or old-earth creationism?]]

In my opinion, for whatever its worth, is that the natural reading of the Bible doesn’t definitively say. It “intimates” that it may be young, but allows for an old earth. One thing seems inescapable and JohnM has it exactly right is that death seemed to be the result of Adam and his sin.

People like Randal and other liberal intelligensia explain this inconvenient fact away because they know that evolution by natural selection is a fact that is not disputed. So they devise clever ways of bringing metaphor in and justify that by saying there were a few in history that looked at Genesis as metaphor.

The fact is evolution by natural selection disproves Genesis, plain and simple and that is simply a pill too hard for many to swallow. People like Hugh Ross (old earth and local flood advocate) were considered “anathema” when they published their first books, but now it is almost mainstream. Christianity is culturally changing before our very eyes. John Loftus sees this and so do I.

I agree that the landscape is changing. And I see many Christians observing the same thing.. Not only when it comes to the bible, but also how Faith is part of people lives.. “the love of many is waxing cold” so to speak. In my country 80% of the population are members of the state Church. But most people are unbelievers who like religious rituals. Their faith has been eroded.

One other thing Andy and this is important. Everything that was once literal is becoming metaphor because science is showing the literal is untenable. So liberal theology is a work horse of turning the literal into metaphor until basically the bible becomes really difficult to understand, which is why you always now get the ruse where these intellectuals make fun of those who actually interpret the bible right!

The whole liberal superstructure is based on this. Why do you think Randal is so good at asking questions but never really answering them? And when he does, he is so vague in obfuscation that it essentially doesn’t mean anything. Welcome to the “new” Christianity.

Yes, I think this is an issue that liberal theologians desperately try to avoid. Catholic theologians usually point to St. Augustine and say “see, even the early church fathers did not believe that everything in Genesis is to be understood literally” – which is true, but misleading, because Augustine along with all other early church fathers did believe in a literal couple Adam & Eve, did believe in a literal Genesis flood and did believe in a literal Tower of Bable. All of these beliefs were only adapted after they were refuted by scientific progress.

Exactly right! And it is my opinion, the only reason they even made parts of Genesis metaphor is perhaps they had enough wisdom and foresight of knowing that this earth appeared very old to them.

The fact of evolution has caused such a stir to the religious that even to this very day a lot of Christians deny it, fight against it, and go to court to campaign against it. Can you imagine that? Why do they single out this over against relativity when both have equally as much evidence?

Andy, well this even proves my point EVEN more. For if evolution is a much more robust “theory”, and it seems it is based on what you have shown me, than it is inescapable. It is as much fact as anything could be.

After reading Dawkings, “The Greatest Show on Earth” and Jerry Coyne’s book (along with many others), I cannot see how one can dispute evolution except by misunderstanding it.

Not sure why you love it, it is riddled with so many errors and misunderstandings. The fine tuning he presents has clearly been refuted by Victor Stenger in his book, “The Fallacy of Fine Tuning”, so all this guy is doing is repeating a mantra rather than understanding what science has to say in the matter. His understanding of evolution is almost entirely from creationist claptrap and and caricatures of it. So, this is actually a prime example of someone who doesn’t even understand what the hell he is even talking about.

The reason you “love this guy” is simply because you have an unfalsifiable faith and hold to your sectarian views. For if you understood the scientific evidence, you would have been ashamed of this guy and what he says.

I could only stand the first few minutes, until he started pulling huge numbers out of his ass that allegedly represent a probability for a hypothetical event that is not even remotely similar to anything that any scientist ever proposed. And before that, he already managed to completely misunderstand the second law of thermodynamics and to “criticize” Evolution for the lack of a specific kind of observation, a kind of observation that would actually conclusively refute darwinian Evolution. And all of that in less than five minutes.

But the hypocrisy really is amazing, if someone told JohnM “the probability that God exists is 1 in 10^489126498162946129846129468912, ergo, God doesn´t exist”, he would probably ask “where the fuck did you get this number from??”. But if you do the exact same thing to “disprove” Evolution, he just stares at the screen thinking “WOW, 1 in a trillion octillion chances, Evolution clearly is impossible, I love this guy!”.

“Why do you think Randal is so good at asking questions but never really answering them? And when he does, he is so vague in obfuscation that it essentially doesn’t mean anything.” – John Grove

Survival instinct. If someone is pinned down re. all the fine points re. what they believe, they can be branded or “painted into a corner”. Being vague gives a person some “wiggle room”. That is my opinion re. why some people are vague re. their specific views on weighty matters.

JohnG said : The whole liberal superstructure is based on this. Why do you think Randal is so good at asking questions but never really answering them?

I think that statement is very unfair to Randal. I find that he gives good answers to hard questions. And that he often engage with difficult questions. I enjoy reading his answers, even though I may sometimes see things a bit different than him.

Mark 1 : 15“The time has come,” he said. “The kingdom of God has come near. Repent AND believe the good news! ( the gospel )”

JohnG said : It didn’t simply make salvation “possible”, it actually SAVED people.

If that was true, then the following verses would not be found in the bible:

Matthew 7 : 21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

Now a common objection to that from Calvinist, is that the people who said Lord Lord to Christ were never in the body of Christ in the first place. But that’s refuted by the bible itself:

Romans 10:13for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

And another verse:

2 Timothy 2:11-12IF we have died with him, we will also live with him; IF we endure, we will also reign with him; IF we deny him, he also will deny us;

Again, you miss the forest for the trees. Mark and Matthew are on Old Testament ground and this was before the Pauline revelation, and this was still when Christ was a “minister to the circumcision”. So please quit quoting verses from the gospels. The gospel of the grace of God was not even being preached yet.

2 Tim 2:11-12 is about enduring hardness. And Paul was exhorting not just to endure but to strive for mastery (vs 3-4). Furthermore, the faithful saying by Paul is NOT saying you will lose salvation. In the first part of this chapter, Paul is urging Timothy to endure for the cause of Christ. He gives Timothy the example of the soldier, who works hard to please his master and the farmer, who works for the reward of the harvest, etc. He then quotes a hymn in verses 11-12 to give Timothy further motivation for enduring. I do not think this phrase from a hymn can be justified to mean that a person can be unplucked from the Fathers’s hand, unsealed and removed. That would mean that a person is justified by what they DO rather than what Christ did. This is essentially what you are saying.

You have a knack of singling out verses that are vague to overthrow verses that are crystal clear, and that is the worst of all biblical hermeneutics. You don’t take a verse where Paul is quoting a hymn to encourage Timothy as a soldier and endure hardship as meaning you can lose salvation, that would be nonsense. Paul is trying to encourage Timothy.

I’m not going to stop exposing your lack of insight, by quoting the words of Jesus himself, and comparing them to the words of Paul, so that everyone can see, that it is indeed the same gospel being preached.

JohnG said : The gospel of the grace of God was not even being preached yet.

You’re wrong.

Isaiah 42 : 6-7“I, the Lord, have called you in righteousness; I will take hold of your hand. I will keep you and will make you to be a covenant for the people and a light for the Gentiles, to open eyes that are blind, to free captives from prison and to release from the dungeon those who sit in darkness.”

Isaiah 53:5But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.

Consider the following scenario: a guy, lets call him “John”, is convinced that he has to become an expert in every single field of inquiry to have warranted beliefs and that otherwise, all opinions he hears of have exactly equal merit. Now, John needs three things: 1. he needs his laptop fixed. 2. he needs someone to fix the plumbing in his house. 3. he needs a medical solution for the severe stomach pain that has been plaguing him for weeks. He needs all of this soon, and neither has the time nor the money to finish medical school, become a plumber, and become an IT professional. So, he asks his cleaning lady for advice on how to fix his computer, his plumbing and what to do about his stomach pains – since her opinion would be just as valid as that of an IT professional, a plumber and a medical doctor respectively. 2 questions: 1. Is John a rational person? 2. How does John´s behavious not logically follow from this comment of yours:

We have before us, 6 possibilities, represented by 6 different opinions.

What’s the likelihood of The Informed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Uninformed Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Expert Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Amateur Opinion? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Consensus Opinion ? 1/6 What’s the likelihood of The Doctors Opinion? 1/6

JohnG : How can you adhere to something that you don’t understand without interpretation?

I think you and I mean different things by interpretation. Clearly you do not understand the text yourself, it is foolishness to you, and so you rely on people like Edwin Palmer to try and make some sense of it.

That’s not what I mean by interpretation. I mean reading something, and being able to place it in the right context, and discover several layers in the text, as one reads it.

To some people The Parable of the Good Samaritan, is just a story with moral teachins. But once you actually understands who the Samaritans were, you begin to see many different layers in the story. Something that would have been obvious to the people who Jesus told the story. But is often lost on people reading it today.

And according to Calvinism, you’re still saved, right? You have no choice, but to be saved, no matter how wicked you are, right? You don’t even need to repent, right? You can live like the devil and go to heaven, right?

That my friend, is the darkest pit of hell. And there are many people who have lost their victory in Christ, to such demonic lies. Including yourself.

Unconditional election is the teaching that before God created the world, he chose to save some people according to his own purposes and apart from any conditions related to those persons. The doctrine was first articulated by Church Father Augustine of Hippo, and is today most commonly associated with Calvinism.

Some people have been chosen to go to hell. Some people have been chosen to go to heaven. It doesn’t matter what you think or say. You have no choice or say in your own salvation, according to calvinism. It doesn’t matter how you live, if you repent, if you take up your cross and follow Christ and what horrible things you commit. You can live like the devil and still go to heaven. You can even mock God, mock the holy spirit, become an atheist, and still go to heaven. That’s what calvinism is.

Well you need to “interpret” it to some extent. And by that I mean understand what you’re actually reading and in what context. If you merely adhered, you’ll end up following the law of the old testament, until you get to the new testament, where you learn that the Law brings wrath.

Ahh… so that is what it feels like actually having someone on your side.. Hehe. Well “The enemy of my enemy” quote comes to mind. But really… Neither of you guys are my enemy. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood” 😉

Also I’m a pacifist.. So don’t expect me to go all Ak47 with suicide belt on you.

II No more than the ‘witnesses’ of the NT, none of which claim to have been eye witnesses to the miraculous events of the life of ‘jesus’ therein described. And there are no historical mentions of ‘jesus’ anywhere outside of the NT. Sorry. Even less for ‘Moses’.

And how would a writer from any period except the lifetime of this ‘Moses’ be worth more than spit?

Sin and death are closely connected. Death is the wages of sin. That’s why it’s very problematic to introduce death before the fall. Especially since the bible proclaims death to be the enemy of God. And so clearly not something that he would have placed in his creation, that he saw was good.

I do think that you’re creating a problem of evil where there is none. But that’s your own problem 😉

[[If the “world” Paul speaks of refers to the human and animal world why punctuate that “death spread to all ** men ** because they had all sinned”? (Romans 5:12) (Emphasis mine.)]]

Good point. Sometimes people like JohnM see the phrase the “world” and things it means everyone without exception, when it clearly does not mean this. John 3:16 is a fine example of this and Edwin Palmer says:

“It was just because God so loved the world of elect sinners that he sent His only begotten Son that the world might be saved through Him (John 3.16-17). In this passage, ‘world’ does not mean every single person, reprobate as well as elect, but the whole world in the sense of people from every tribe and nation—not only the Jews” (The Five Points of Calvinism, p.44-45)

JohnG said : Sometimes people like JohnM see the phrase the “world” and things it means everyone without exception

The greek word used, is “Kosmos”. That says it all 🙂

JohnG said : Edwin Palmer says: “It was just because God so loved the world of elect sinners that he sent His only begotten Son that the world might be saved through Him (John 3.16-17). In this passage, ‘world’ does not mean every single person…

Sure it does. God so loved every single person in his creation, that gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

You Calvinist lies about “election” are refuted by this verse as well..

Matthew and Mark are Old Testament, why do you go there consistently to refute Paul’s revelation of the grace of God? Mark 1:15 is the gospel of the Kingdom, NOT the gospel of the grace of God!

1. Under this commission the apostles were sent to the nation Israel exclusively (Matt. 10:5,6, cf. 15:24 and Rom. 15:8).

2. Under this commission the kingdom was to be proclaimed “at hand” (Matt.10:7).

3. Under this commission the apostles were given miraculous powers (Matt.10:8).

4. Under this commission they were not to lay up provisions for the future (Matt. 10:8-10, cf. 5:42, Luke 12:32,33).

5. Under this commission repentance and baptism were required for the remission of sins. It is clear that the apostles, like John the Baptist, proclaimed the kingdom and required repentance and baptism for the remission of sins (See Mark 1:4 and cf. John 4:1,2).

You thoroughly do not understand the Bible at all.

[[Jesus died for all ( John 1:29 ). But not all who he died for, are willing to repent, believe the gospel, take up their cross, and follow Christ.]]

How can a dead man believe? He has to be regenerated to believe, take up her cross and follow Christ.

Joseph said : If the “world” Paul speaks of refers to the human and animal world why punctuate that “death spread to all ** men ** because they had all sinned”? (Romans 5:12) (Emphasis mine.)

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned

1) Sin comes into the world though one man ( Adam ). 2) And death though sin. 3) And therefore death came to all men ( including you and me at some point ) because we have all fallen short of the glory of God.

Death in the world, is a product of sin. And you and I shall suffer the first death. Not because of Adam’s sin. But because of our own actions.

The bible is basically explaining to us, why there is death in the world.

You’re correct. ?????? is never employed in the Scriptures in reference to the animal kingdom. Hence, when Paul says ?????? at Romans 5:12 he is referring to the human race. As such, the ?????? he speaks of here does not include the animal kingdom. Consequently, the death of animals did not begin with Adam’s sin meaning they’ve always been mortal.

Romans 8 :18-21I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

Animals are not humans. Humans are not animals. But God does take animals seriously. In the old testament, animals were sacrificed to atone for sin. So animals were actually able to pay the price of the actions of evildoers. Animals are not just meat, milk and eggs. Animals are God creations too.

The question to ask yourself is this.. Does animals even need Christ’s sacrifice as such? Are they sinners in need of salvation? Or are they innocent of this situation that we are in? And is that why their deaths were able to atone for our sin, before Christ?

In the Hebrew language, God’s personal name is written ???????. These four letters, called the Tetragrammaton, are read from right to left in Hebrew and can be represented in many modern languages as YHWH or JHVH. God’s name, represented by these four consonants, appears almost 7,000 times in the original “Old Testament,” or Hebrew Scriptures.

In English, the Tetragrammaton is translated “Jehovah”. Here’s how it’s translated in many other languages –

As a carnivore I can’t condemn animal predation as morally evil without condemning myself.

The short answer on how I deal with the existence of natural evil is that I do not believe in an omnibenevolent deity who takes a personal interest in each of us animals (rational or otherwise), or one who has any moral obligation to us. That is not to say that I believe in a malevolent deity per se, but it would be fair to say that I believe in a prime mover who is, at least to some extent, indifferent towards suffering. My belief in a pitiless creator closely parallels an atheist’s belief in a pitiless and indifferent universe. This is why many atheists consider a deistic god to be logically possible, but entirely irrelevant.

Not necessarily. I like the analogy of a computer programmer who succeeds in creating artificial life. The programmer/creator would establish rules for the A.I. to follow in order to flourish within its created environment, but that doesn’t mean that those same rules would constrain the programmer. Further, the programmer might have a certain degree of “affection” for the “life” that he or she created, but there is no reason that I can adduce that the programmer must have any obligations towards that which was created by him or her.

From whence comes binding moral obligations on an infinite being? Is there a level of moral law that is greater than he? Comparing the Creator/created relationship to a Father/child relationship is flawed because human parents have binding objective moral duties to their biological offspring. An infinite being would not be bound by a higher moral law.

Let’s assume that is the purpose of morality. But what’s so great about maximizing human flourishing? Couldn’t God just as easily wanted the minimizing of human flourishing? Further, given that God is indifferent to human suffering, why think God wants human flourishing? And even if he does want it, perhaps now that we know that he is indifferent to human suffering, perhaps the best thing we could do is defy such a deity and bring our species to an end.

Is God indifferent to the wildebeest that is eaten alive by the cheetah? I would answer that he must be indifferent, else he wouldn’t have created the world the way it is. That doesn’t mean that God hasn’t established an ordered universe where predator and prey can both flourish, often at the expense of other creatures. Same with objective morals for humans. Setting up a system where created beings can flourish in their existence is the hallmark of an efficient Creator. Why create humans if he is indifferent to suffering? I don’t know. Why create prey animals that stand a good chance of being ripped apart and consumed to supply nutrition for another creature’s benefit? I can’t say.

You see, I simply cannot believe in an anthropopathic deity who cries with us every time a child dies of cancer, yet created a universe where tragedies like these happen again and again. So the only two options for me are to believe in a Creator who does not share human emotions, or to reject theism/deism outright. My acceptance of formal and final causes in nature leads me away from atheism and towards belief in a transcendent Prime Mover, so I am kind of stuck with deism.

perhaps now that we know that he is indifferent to human suffering, perhaps the best thing we could do is defy such a deity and bring our species to an end.

Why do that? If we did we would lose the goodness of existence itself.

Describing your situation as “stuck with deism” is interesting. It’s as if you’re not completely happy with it, but don’t see a way out. I see a couple of possible avenues:

1) God does cry every time a child dies of cancer, but allows it to happen for good reasons, that we do not understand. Part of God’s redemption of this obvious evil situation will be raising the child from the dead.

2) The New Testament seems to see the Earth as being enemy held territory, which God has invaded and is in the process of winning back; which is why it teaches people to pray that God’s kingdom will come. Obviously there would be no need to pray for it to come if it were already here. While the enemy is in charge, we shouldn’t expect God’s will to be done here as it is in Heaven. We might complain and ask why God allowed the enemy to take over Earth to begin with. And I think that takes us back to (1). But at least we now have slightly more information to go on. Not a complete answer, but at least more information.

Sorry, I don’t view the New testament as a divine revelation, so I am unable to agree with your answers. As I have said, I cannot believe in an anthropopathic Creator who is reluctantly inflicting tragedies upon us in order to achieve some nebulous greater good. That feels too much like a psychological coping mechanism.

When I say that I am “stuck with deism” it doesn’t mean that I am unhappy, it means that I am not always satisfied that my worldview provides all the answers. But since I have been respectively a Christian, an atheist, and now a deist, I know that no worldview completely assuages all doubt–it is why I hold my metaphysical beliefs quite tentatively, and why I border on full-blown agnosticism.

Your inability to believe in an anthropopathic Creator certainly doesn’t seem to be based on a logical contradiction. It seems it must have some psychological basis, which isn’t shared by most people. Frankly, I see a logical problem in believing that a deist god would care about humanity in general, but not about humanity in the particular. If God doesn’t care about an individual human, why should we think he cares about humans in the collective? To an infinite God, even a few billion people is but a drop in the bucket. If numbers are what interest God, bacteria would be far more interesting.

Does the Christian God personally care about bacteria and viruses? Does he personally care when a wildebeest is experiencing excruciating pain, while it is being consumed alive? To say that you see a logical problem with a God who creates us without loving us in a personal way commits you to believing that God must love every living thing in a very personal way. You might respond that humans are special, and that God cares more about us than he does plants or non-rational animals, but that just begs the question. Maybe creation isn’t all about us. Maybe we are here just to serve a purpose like bacteria do. Forgive me for saying so, but your viewpoint seems highly anthropocentric.

I’m inclined to say that yes, God personally cares about bacteria and viruses. As much as plants and animals? I would say not. Does God care about plants and animals as much as he cares about human beings? Again, I would say not. I base these opinions on two things:

1) There is intrinsic value in a good creation. Just as an artist cares about that which he/she creates, I think God also cares about what he creates.

2) Given Jesus’s teaching that not even a sparrow falls to the ground without God knowing about it, but that we are of much more value than many sparrows, there seems to be a hierarchy in the value that God places on different parts of his creation. We tend to share that hierarchical value ourselves. If we have children and pets, we love them both, but our children much more, if we are psychologically healthy. And if Aristotelian thought is correct, we should expect such an hierarchy, since there are different levels of souls.

It would not surprise me to find out that we are here to serve some higher purpose. But that doesn’t mean that we are merely means to an end. I don’t believe that God sees anything as merely a means to an end. Thinking that one must be either a means or an end, but not both, seems to be a highly anthropomorphic (?) idea to me.

I’m still struggling with the idea of the teleology based morality. How do you distinguish between “natural” and “unnatural”? And how do you fixate on the natural, if the natural changes over time? At some point it was natural for us walk around naked. It sure as hell is unnatural now. I’m sure the Aristotelians have some good answers, but I have yet to find a book with such answers.

Nevertheless, the strongest argument for teleology is that we simply cannot make sense of the real world without appealing to final and efficient causality. Otherwise we just have to give up our realism altogether. And like it or not, teleology leads us to the First Cause. It’s inescapable. All the examples of horrendous and disgusting evil cannot trump that.

And of course a general theist can agree that God simple sustains, but not guides our lives. He still can be perfectly good in somehow compensation for all suffering afterwards. There’s certainly no logical inconsistency.

I believe the question to be moot. For those who believe our moral values are nothing more than evolutionary by-products, for example, I’d ask, “if you’re taking your cues on what normal behavior is from the realm of irrational beasts why don’t you chop the heads off your partners after sex like the irrational Praying Mantis? Or how about committing dominance rape or having sex with young children as practiced by irrational primates? How about eating your own feces the way irrational pigs, dogs, cows and primates enjoy it? Why shouldn’t it be legal for you to kill and eat babies the way irrational beasts can and do?” This is why the “natural” vs. “unnatural” issue is moot.

But Randal, don’t many of your motivators for why you believe have evidence based consequences which, ultimately, could be studied? If not, then it seems there is a problem with how you might be interpreting the information, which comes to you experientially.

I’m not sure what you’re asking or asserting here. All sorts of properly basic beliefs can be investigated. That doesn’t mean they aren’t properly basic. It just means that their justification could be defeated, which is precisely what I said.

So it seems you are trying to articulate a classical foundationalist criterion of proper basicality. But your statement of it is inaccurate. Classical foundationalism restricts proper basicality to beliefs that are self-evident or incorrigible. That’s different from the “universal assent” criterion you articulated. Nobody accepts your universal assent criterion. Your criterion is obviously false. Take a complex mathematical axiom. It may be properly basic for the mathematician even if most people could not understand it.

As for classical foundationalism, it has been widely rejected for several reasons (e.g. self-referential defeat, lack of justification, skeptical implications).

It was Alvin Plantinga that convinced me properly basic beliefs couldn’t exist. I know that’s not his position, but the example he gave always trouble me.

Plantinga described the belief in the color red ass properly basic. That is, I percieve red redly, and this is properly basic because there’s no other belief supporting the idea that this is the red we are experiencing.

I instantly though of my friend, who is color blind. And I realized, it’s not that they are experiencing red differently, they simply cannot experience red.

Then I thought, well then properly basic beliefs must, at the very least, be contingent on our belief that our experiences accurately reflect the world around us.

Hmmm, I think you’re misunderstanding the concept of proper basicality.

Let’s start here:

“properly basic beliefs must, at the very least, be contingent on our belief that our experiences accurately reflect the world around us.”

This is incorrect. Say, for example, that I have the experience of seeing a red apple on the table. If what you say here is correct, I’d have to reason like this:

(1) I seem to see a red apple on the table. (2) My sense perceptual faculties are reliable. (3) Therefore, I see a red apple on the table.

But if we really had to reason like this then we’d be in trouble, because we clearly don’t reason like this. Consequently, your demand would leave us unjustified in accepting the vast majority of our sense perceptual beliefs.

As the foundationalist observes, what in fact happens is that the experience of seeming to see the apple provides the occasion for the belief “I see a red apple on the table.” Thus, the belief is, in fact, properly basic.

The reliability of our cognitive faculties does come in, of course, but only when we become aware of defeaters to the truth of the proposition “I see a red apple on the table.”

I think you have another misunderstanding as well. I learn the concepts of “red”, “apple”, “table, and “on” at different points in my intellectual formation. But those past experiences of learning the meaning and use of these concepts does not contribute at all to the justification I have for believing “There is a red apple on the table.” That justification is wholly based in the experience of seeing the red apple on the table (or at least seeming to see it, since obviously sense perception is defeasible).

We agree that properly basic beliefs are not contingent on other beliefs.

What I am pointing out is that in order to believe we are experiencing red, before we can even define it, we must believe our senses are valid. If not, we could never get to the definition. So, sylogism aside, a set of beliefs is required to be held in order to get to properly basic beliefs in the first place.

At which point I do not think a properly basic belief is entirely basic. It is supported by experientially formed beliefs, and the belief that we can know red, the belief that red is not another color, and the belief that red will continue to be red. Along with the belief that our experience of red is correct, only then, once the set is established, can we say red is red.

As I mentioned, constructivism says we construct knowledge via experience. So there can be no properly basic experience because it requires sets to form beliefs.

Yeah, I got that, and I’m pointing out that it isn’t true. Does a four year old have justified sense perceptual beliefs? Of course. Does a four year old base those beliefs on the prior belief that his “senses are valid”? Certainly not. He just takes the world as it comes, and only begins to question specific beliefs when he has a reason to do so.